Harrington, Ryan Join Planning Board After Higher-Than-Average Turnout at Town Election

The day was gloomy and wet, but that didn't stop around 1,600 voters from coming out to cast their ballot at Burlington High School for the 2025 town election.

That's after more than 1,800 early ballots were received as of Friday, bringing the total preliminary turnout to 3,345, or 18.6% of registered voters. That's nowhere near the town's turnout for primary and presidential elections, but higher than Burlington's average of around 15% from 2019-2023.

Last year, more than 22% of registered voters came out to vote for the contested Select Board and School Committee races. This year, there was only only one contested town-wide race (Planning Board), as well as a couple of ballot questions.

The Planning Board race ended with Greg Ryan and Jeremy Harrington on top; Jack Kelly, who is a Town Meeting Member and served on the Planning Board for 17 years before resigning in 2019, fell just short. Ryan and Harrington both say they're excited to get started climbing the steep learning curve and seeing how they can support the town's economic vitality through their five-year term. They're filling vacancies left by long-time Board members Bill Gaffney and Ernie Covino, who Ryan pointed out have a combined five decades of experience on the Board. Their shoes will be hard to fill, but the pair is eager to dive in.

Question 1, which would have converted the Town Clerk's position from elected to appointed, lost 46-50%, meaning that incoming Clerk Jennifer Priest will serve for just a year before running for another five year term.

The non-binding question of whether the town should rescind the ban on recreational cannabis dispensaries, Question 2, failed by a wider margin than in the state-wide vote in 2016 that prompted Town Meeting to vote in a town-wide ban in the first place. Only 40% of voters said they'd be in favor of lifting the ban, while 58% said "No, thanks." The original vote was 46-54.

The only surprise in the rest of the town-wide races were the 317 and 248 write-in votes for School Committee and Library Trustees, respectively. While not enough to affect the outcome of the races, these seats had more write-ins than the rest of the town-wide races by a large margin. Names of write-in candidates haven't been released.

Results for contested Town Meeting races are as follows:

Precinct 1:

• Mimi Bix-Hylan
• Michelle Huntoon
• Florence Leone
• Gregory Ryan
• Maureen Ryan
• Shannon Robinson

Shayan Battacherya fell short in this race, but since Greg Ryan earned the Planning Board seat, it's possible Shayan will rise into Greg's Town Meeting seat.

Precinct 3:

• Sean Connors
• Chris Hartling
• Sharon Lore
• Steven Morin
• Bryan Pupa
• Martha Simon

Precinct 6:

• Bob Aloisi
• Dan Collins
• Dan DiTucci
• James Fraczek
• Anthony Clark
• Matt Denaro

Precinct 7:

• Adriane Callahan
• Cynthia Kazanjian
• Keri Riley
• Tony Salamone
• Paul Shvartsman
• Dan Van Camp

There were one-year open seats for Precinct 1 and 3, and both got a number of write-in candidates, which—if a single candidate got enough votes—might mean those seats are filled, too.

Full preliminary results can be found on the town website.