Voter registration is up, early voting has begun and town clerks across the Island are busy preparing for what is expected to be one of the busiest general elections in Martha’s Vineyard history.
Election day is Tuesday, Nov. 5.
With the bitterly divided presidential race on the national stage, several hotly contested ballot questions in Massachusetts, a state senate race and a contest for the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, it all adds up to a hefty ballot for Island voters to consider this year. Town clerks said they are bracing for a large and possibly record turnout.
“I want everyone to get out and vote and feel confident at the ballot box,” said Colleen Morris, the Oak Bluffs town clerk. “It’s the most patriotic thing someone can do.”
If the voter registration data is any indication, there could be even more voters this year than in 2020, which saw a record number of ballots cast on the Island.
Just a few days before voter registration closes on Oct. 26, towns reported an increase of about 1,500 voters Islandwide compared with four years ago. As of this week, there are about 17,000 voters on the Vineyard, compared with 15,499 in 2020, records show.
Early voting, which began Oct. 19 and runs through Nov. 1, already appears to brisk. As of Wednesday this week, 2,890 Vineyard voters had cast ballots, or about 17 per cent of the Island’s registered voters. Mail-in voting is also proving popular. According to state numbers, about a quarter of all Island voters — 4,407 voters to be exact — have requested mail-in ballots.
The trends mirror what Secretary of State Bill Galvin is reporting for all of Massachusetts. By Wednesday, 818,904 ballots had already been cast statewide, or about 16.2 per cent of all voters. About 1.3 million people have requested mail-in ballots, about 27 per cent of voters.
Town clerks said this week that early voting has begun to catch on as a trend.
“Based on my gut instinct and anecdotal feedback, it seems like early voting has become more popular,” said Tara Whiting-Wells, the West Tisbury town clerk. “Having multiple ways to vote is a fabulous thing. The more we can make voting accessible, [the better].”
The two alternatives to voting in-person on election day proved popular and useful in 2020, when the presidential election came at the height of the Covid pandemic. Four years later, some clerks expect trends to be a little different.
“It is more likely voters will vote on this election day compared to 2020, as we are not in Covid lockdown,” said Hillary Conklin, the Tisbury town clerk. “From 2020 to 2022, our election day [in-person voter] numbers went from 699 to 1,112,” she noted.
No place in Dukes County uses mail-in ballots and early voting more than Gosnold, the neighboring string of islands called the Elizabeth Islands that includes Cuttyhunk.
As of Wednesday, the tiny town already seen 37 ballots cast, or about 37 per cent of the town’s 100 voters. That made it the municipality with the highest turnout so far in Massachusetts by percentage, according data from the secretary of state.
The statistic was a surprise to Lisa Wright, the Gosnold town clerk.
“It seems like people are getting out and voting,” she said with a laugh.
In Chilmark, town clerk Jennifer Christy expected turnout could be as high as 85 per cent of the town’s nearly 1,200 voters. The key to keeping things running smoothly, especially in a town that still counts ballots by hand, is organization.
“You have to be quite organized and a good communicator,” Ms. Christy said. “Having some thorough checklists have been helpful for me due to the sheer amount of deadlines and legal requirements in the new age of early voting.”
Having voting running for two weeks before the election can be taxing on clerks, but they still go above and beyond to make sure Islanders can cast their ballots. Ms. Morris in Oak Bluffs said she personally delivers mail-in ballots to the Woodside and Aidylberg elderly housing complexes, as well as the Windemere nursing home.
“Our seasoned residents have seen a lot of things,” she said. “They’ve seen many a presidential [election] . . . I’ve grown kind of attached to them.”
Massachusetts has reliably voted Democrat in presidential elections going back 40 years to President Ronald Reagan. At one time, the Vineyard was a Republican stronghold; from 1860 to 1964, the Island consistently went for Republican presidential candidates, including going in with Richard Nixon over John F. Kennedy.
But now, the Island is one of the bluest parts of the state. According to a breakdown from the secretary of state taken during the state primaries, the Dukes County voter pool is about 34 per cent Democrat and 7 per cent Republican. Unenrolled voters make up about 59 per cent of the rolls.
Percentage-wise, the Island has the highest proportion of Democrats in the state with the exception of Suffolk County.
Kayla Darcy, the Aquinnah town clerk, said it’s too early to tell which way her town is headed.
“Seeing around town the signs that are put-up for Harris-Walz, it seems that that’s where we’re leaning but we won’t actually know until 9 o’clock Nov. 5,” she said.
Louisa Hufstader, Katrina Liu, Gwyn Skiles and Addison Antonoff contributed reporting.
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