On Monday, May 6, 2024, a total of 2,579 residents participated in Acton’s Annual Town Meeting. This set a new record for Town Meeting participation. On a percentage basis,16.7% of registered voters – roughly one out of six eligible voters – struggled to find parking and a seat inside the Acton-Boxborough Regional High School (ABRHS).
Two hundred sixty towns in Massachusetts hold open town meetings, as Acton does. According to the Massachusetts Municipal Association, thirty-two towns (for example, Lexington) have representative town meetings (allowed for towns with at least 6,000 voters). And fifty cities don’t have town meetings.
The Town of Acton provided a parking and shuttle service to handle the record turnout. Parking locations not only included ABRHS on 36 Charter Road, but also: RJ Grey Jr. High School, Parker Damon Building, two Boardwalk School locations, St. Elizabeth of Hungary Parish, Congregation Beth Elohim, and the South Acton Commuter Lot.
The Town also provided van service for non-drivers to get to and from Town Meeting. The driver, Bonnie, waited during the meeting in case anyone wanted to go home early.
For parents who couldn’t find a babysitter, there was a kid-friendly movie night in the Chorus Room of ABRHS. One hundred twenty-six school-aged children, some wearing pajamas and holding a cozy blanket, were chaperoned by adult volunteers (all CORI-checked school district employees).
As veterans of Town Meeting know, voters were given “clickers” so they could vote more quickly than they did in the old days, when voters were asked to stand up to be counted, tellers had to count them by hand, and the Town Clerk had to tally the total results.
Although Acton now owns 1,900 clickers, Town Clerk Eva Szkaradek had rented another 1,300 in anticipation of an attendance surge. But the record turnout still caused some unanticipated challenges.
Clicker distribution was planned for 900 in the ABRHS Auditorium, 1,800 for the Upper Gym (officially named the Thomas J. Regan Fieldhouse), and 500 for the Lower Gym (officially named the Isadore Stearns Gymnasium). The cafeteria overflow was planned as a fourth tier to be manually counted “old school,” if necessary.
And it was.
On Monday night, the Town Clerk’s election team gave colored cards to voters in the cafeteria to hold in the air when it came time to vote. The results were quickly tallied and texted to members of the Town’s Information Technology (IT) department, who were working on Town Meeting, including Chief Information Officer Mark Hald and Chief Technology Officer Matt Frost. The “old school” votes were seamlessly added to the electronic tally from the clickers used in other parts of the high school.
