Oak Bluffs voted in favor of catch-and-release shark tournaments, West Tisbury approved a new police station and Edgartown approved two spending projects during Thursday’s town elections.

Voter turnout was sparse, between nine and 13 per cent, and few races were contested.

Oak Bluffs voters approved a nonbinding referendum that would make shark tournaments in town catch and release only by a margin of 225 to 186.

Martha’s Vineyard followed the mood of the state and the country Tuesday when thousands of voters trekked to the polls to help re-elect President Barack Obama to a second term and cast ballots for Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren and incumbent Cong. William Keating.

In their mock election Tuesday, Vineyard high schoolers voted overwhelmingly for President Obama.

The Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School cafeteria served as a polling station for a mock presidential election Tuesday afternoon; 25 per cent of enrolled students cast ballots.

History teacher Andrew Vandall said his leadership class initiated the mock election where about 700 students were able to vote during lunch.

Martha’s Vineyard followed the mood of the state and the country Tuesday, when high numbers of voters turned out to the polls to help re-elect President Barack Obama to a second term and cast ballots for Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren and incumbent Cong. William Keating.

The first returns from Dukes County are in: Gosnold, the seventh town in the county and smallest town in Massachusetts, narrowly voted for Barack Obama, casting 49 votes for the incumbent president and 36 votes for his challenger, Mitt Romney.

In the closely-watched U.S. Senate race, it was a nearly even split with Scott Brown beating Elizabeth Warren by a single vote, 44-43.

Islanders lined up at the polls today to cast ballots in a presidential election that has riveted and divided the country.

Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Polling places are Aquinnah town offices, the Chilmark Community Center, the Edgartown town hall, the Oak Bluffs public library, the American Legion Hall in Vineyard Haven, and the West Tisbury public safety building.

Vineyard voters go to the polls Tuesday to cast ballots in the 2012 presidential election. And while the big draw is the race for president and large turnouts are expected here as elsewhere, Vineyard voters will also makes choices on a host of other state and local issues, from a close Massachetts Senate race to the Martha’s Vineyard Commission to medical marijuana.

What was once a conservative enclave has given way to a reliable liberal stronghold. And the place where Franklin D. Roosevelt reportedly earned the respect of Islanders (if not their votes) by caring more for his boat than he did for electioneering is now known as the summer vacation spot for presidents whose ice cream shop visits and golf games make headlines.

As around the country, the political landscape of Martha’s Vineyard is ever shifting.

School costs are driving budget increases across the Island, but in Chilmark, one expense forcing voters to dig into their wallets for education spending may come as a shock.

The Menemsha School, barely four years old, already needs $100,000 in repairs that include replacing moldy floors and rotten doors. Voters will be asked Monday night at annual town meeting to foot the bill. The meeting begins at 7:30 p.m. in the Chilmark Community Center.

The annual town election takes place Wednesday and will feature five override questions, but no contested races.

Sturdy brown envelopes, some of them mailed from as far away as the Netherlands, Italy and Russia, are stacked up tall on the desk of Wanda Williams, the town clerk in Edgartown.

Ask Ms. Williams or any of the Island's other five town clerks how things are going the week before Election Day, and you'll hear a deep sigh. They are swamped, not only with a surge of those brown envelopes containing absentee ballots but also with tallying up new voters.