Forwarding email about voting

[Sue D]

HI all,

I received this email, and have heard from other reliable sources that as long as you are a Grafton resident, a registered voter, and come to the town meeting you will be able to vote.

I am copying the email below.

Sue
************************************************

I have wanted to touch base with all of you regarding a "rumor" I have heard through the grapevine. In contacting you I was hoping with your email list you may be able to clarify this for others.

It has been said that with out a seat at town meeting we are not allowed to vote.  Emails have been sent around as well as the chatter at PTG meetings. We all can respect the fire marshal's job in only allowing a certain number of people in the auditorium at one time. However, the town is not allowed to tell us we can not vote as registered voters.  I went into the Town Clerk's office today to get a direct answer. There was no wavering on her behalf, should our auditorium fill to capacity the town moderator has an overflow plan in place, first using the gymnasium. We will all have a chance to cast our votes on May 12th.

Just wanted to clarify in case you have heard differently.

***********************************************

[Gopal Shenoy]

Hi Sue,

This is what I was told by John Carlson, current selectman and
standing for re-election.

Gopal

[Sue D]

I appreciate that you heard that from John Carlson.  Unfortunately there is conflicting information coming from town hall.  One of my contacts heard information from the Town Clerk, the other, from Ray Meade, our Town Moderator. My information is there will be monitors set up in different areas to accommodate every Grafton citizen who comes to town meeting and is registered to vote.   Since I have not heard first hand from any of these people I will call town hall directly on Monday.

I have to say, when I first saw the statement about being blocked out of the vote due to fire codes, I was taken aback.  I am very inclined to believe that it would be illegal to shut out registered citizens of Grafton because the own chose a venue that was too small to accommodate all of them.

Sue

[SueZ]

In the past, they have had overflow crowds go into the gym, so there's
no reason to think that they wouldn't do that again. One of the past
debt exclusion votes was done by ballot at a special meeting on a
Saturday morning, so that parents could be accommodated, and so that
they could accurately count the 2/3-required vote. So certainly in
the past, all votes at Town Meeting have been counted and
accommodations have been made to make sure everyone could be there.
In 11 years, I have never known this town to not accept every vote.

So go to Town Meeting on the 12th.

On May 3, 10:25�am, "Sue D" <lizngabs...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I appreciate that you heard that from John Carlson. �Unfortunately there is
> conflicting information coming from town hall. �One of my contacts heard
> information from the Town Clerk, the other, from Ray Meade, our Town
> Moderator. My information is there will be monitors set up in different
> areas to accommodate every Grafton citizen who comes to town meeting and is

> registered to vote. � Since I have not heard *first hand* from any of these

> > > ***********************************************- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Gopal Shenoy]

Hi Sue,

Just to set records straight - he did mention about the overflow area.

You raise a very good point about the need to extend voting hours - I
raised this issue.
Many parents may have kids that they may not want to leave with baby
sitters. This would
mean that only one of them can be there to vote. Why can the town not
have a special meeting
on a Saturday and have extended voting hours for such an important
topic - it is probably be too
late to raise this issue, but at least start raising this now for the
future because I am sure this will
not be the last such things that come up.

Gopal

[SueZ]

Actually, it turns out that it costs a surprising amount of money to
have a special meeting for an issue on a weekend...I can't remember
how much exactly, but it was quite a bit. So even if it wasn't too
late for the feasibility issue, a $550K debt exclusion probably
wouldn't be the right time to do that. I do agree that it would be
helpful for the space solution vote, whenever that may be, and
provided that we pass the feasibility study. It was, in fact, either
the proposal for the new middle school (that eventually failed), or
the proposal for the new elementary school (that eventually passed),
that occurred on a Saturday morning. It was a special meeting for
only that issue, and the GEA got Girl Scouts or something like that to
help babysit in the gym. It is unfortunate that so many families with
children are not able to send both parents to Town Meeting, as even
trying to get a babysitter on a school night is difficult, and those
meetings can run late. Then again, Saturday mornings in the Fall and
Spring are probably not much better for families with all the town
sports.

> > > - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[carolin...@charter.net]

It is in the town by-laws that spring Town meeting shall be held on
the second Monday in May. So we're obligated to have it then, by
law. That doesn't mean the by-laws couldn't be changed but that
requires a town vote as well.
I did not see any info about selecting a day for a special town
meeting but obviously since this was held in the past on a Saturday,
the choice must be discretionary.

[carolin...@charter.net]

I spoke with both the Town Clerk's office and Board of Selectman's
office today. They re-confirmed that voting is available to all
registered voters who attend Town Meeting. (I suppose if all 11,000
some odd registered voters showed up there could be a problem). The
BOS office tells me that the gym will have a Deputy Town Moderator and
is being wired for sound.
They will put the correct voting info on the Town Website and post an
announcement in the Grafton News.

Please continue to pass along.

Thanks!

[Vijay Gupta]

Sorry, if I missed the information in the email exchanges. I believe the only registered voters who attend Town Meetings are U.S. citizens? Can a permanent resident alien become a registered voter? If yes, then me and my wife want to become a registered voter and vote. Can someone please reply?

 

 - Vijay

[Sue D]

You do need to be a US citizen to register to vote (http://www.sec.state.ma.us/ele/eleifv/howreg.htm).  I should also point out, the deadline to register to vote for this meeting has passed (April 15th.)

Sue