MONTAGUE — For the annual election in May, no voting will take place at Hillcrest Elementary School. Instead, voters in precincts three, four and five will cast their ballots somewhere new.
With unanimous approval from the Selectboard, precincts three and four will be voting at the Montague Senior Center, at 62 5th St. in Turners Falls and precinct five will be voting in the meeting room at the Town Hall at 1 Ave. A in Turners Falls.
The reason for the move are concerns about safety, disruption and parking involved with voting at Hillcrest Elementary School.
Last month, Town Clerk Deb Bourbeau began to explore other locations including the Great Hall at the Great Falls Discovery Center.
Bourbeau said it was time for the town to explore different options for voting locations.
“It’s inconvenient to run a school when we’re having voting,” Bourbeau said. “It also puts the school at risk by being open all day long and open to the public. If anything ever happened, I would not be able to live with myself.”
However, the Great Hall proved to be too expensive and Bourbeau said it would be difficult to schedule special elections.
“We would have to pay a staff person to be there, pay an event fee and support either an environmental police officer for the duration of the election or if an environmental police officer can’t do it, then it goes to the state police,” Bourbeau said. “They would get detail rates and anything over eight hours, they would get paid time and a half.”
She estimated if there were four elections in a year, it would cost the town $6,000 more to vote in the Great Hall.
Selectboard member Mike Nelson said he liked the idea of voting in the Town Hall versus the Great Hall.
Selectboard Chairman Richard Kuklewicz, agreed with Nelson and added that he would like Bourbeau to check in with the board following the election in May.
“I would like us to consider, if we make a change, to talk about it in June or something and see how things went,” Kuklewicz said. “Were there any challenges at Town Hall or the Senior Center? Does this make the best sense or should be formula another plan? Just review it one last time.”
He also proposed having short-term voter parking signs to try to make space for people voting at the Senior Center.
The current precincts and voting locations are as follows:
Precinct one is the Montague Center Precinct which votes at the Montague Center Fire Station, at 28 Old Sunderland Road.
Precinct two is the Millers Falls Precinct which votes at the Highland School Apartments Community Room at 446 Millers Falls Road.
Precinct three is the upper hill section of Turners Falls and Precinct four, the second level of Turners Falls will vote at the Montague Senior Center at 62 5th St., in Turners Falls.
Precinct five is the downtown section of Turners Falls will vote in the meeting room on the third floor of the Town Hall, at 1 Ave. A in Turners Falls.
Precinct six is the south end and Montague City precinct which vote at the Public Safety Complex Community Room at 180 Turnpike Road.