Town Clerk Robin Michaud has over-ordered ballots ahead of this year’s town election, in response to the town running out of ballots in the 2022 election.
In 2022, a chaotic scene unfolded when the town’s three polling locations, consisting of six precincts, ran out of ballots. This forced town officials to photocopy ballots, however those could not be counted by machines. As a result, manual hand counts were needed to finish counting ballots, and the results of the election were delayed by hours.
Some unofficial results from the scanned ballots were available despite the delays from Precincts 2 and 3, representing just 1,522 ballots. Officials were manually counting ballots in the auditorium on the second floor of Abbot Hall. After a long delay, results from the town election were finally posted Wednesday morning inside Abbot Hall.
This year, with more ballots than should be necessary, the town appears to be in better shape to avoid a situation that results in serious delays. Marblehead’s town election will take place on Tuesday, June 20, and polls will open at 8 a.m.
For voters in Precinct 1, the polling location is in Old Town House at 1 Market Sq. For Precincts 2 and 3, the polling location is in the Abbot Hall auditorium at 188 Washington St. For Precincts 4, 5, and 6, the polling location will be at the Judy and Gene Jacobi Community Center gymnasium, located at 10 Humphrey St.