Town moderator contest is close in Blackstone

Poirier wins post by just 22 votes as Blackstone and Millville tally results of municipal elections

BLACKSTONE – After all the annual town election votes were counted Monday night, Mark N. Poirier was officially declared the winner of the town moderator race, narrowly defeating Daniel T. Doyle by 22 votes in what was arguably the closest contest of the night.

Poirier had a grand vote tally of 476, while Doyle ended up collecting a total of 454 votes, according to official election results.

In the race for the threeyear Board of Health seat, incumbent William Walsh was the official winner, defeating challenger Carol J. Perrault, a retired postal worker, by a vote of 586 to 371.

The two declared winners for the two available threeyear seats on the Board of Selectmen were incumbent Margaret Bik and Gerald P. Rivet. Aformer town building inspector and member of the Planning Board, Rivet was top vote-getter with 462 votes. Bik, who is beginning her second term on the board, came in second place with 439 votes, followed by Stephen P. Goudreau, 341 votes; John Matthew Wozniak, 256; John J. Parmentier, 190; and

Catherine M. Norcross-Melson, 145.

Jack R. Keefe, the unopposed candidate for the four-year Blackstone seat on the Blackstone-Millville Regional School Committee, garnered 717 votes, while Caryn Downey Vernon, the unopposed candidate for the four-year Millville seat on the Blackstone-Millville Regional School Committee, collected a total of 597 votes.

Unopposed incumbent Joseph Belrose, Jr. was elected to the five-year seat on the Planning Board with a total of 677 votes.

Atotal of 996, or 16 percent, of the town’s 6,240 registered voters went to the polls Monday, a significantly higher turnout than the 6 percent turnout last year.

Town Clerk Claudette Dolinski didn’t announce the finally election results until well after 10 p.m. because of the high number of write-in votes that had to be counted by hand.

An unexpired Blackstone seat on the Blackstone-Millville Regional School Committee will be filled by Tammy Lemieux, who earned 100 write-in votes; a three-year seat on the Board of Assessors will be filled by Rachel Campopiano who received 10 write-in votes; and a three-year Parks and Recreation Committee seat to be filled by Kim Peloquin who received 20 write-in votes.

Voters in neighboring Millville also went to the polls Monday, electing Thomas S. Houle and Richard Hurteau to two available three-year seats on the Board of Selectmen - the only contest on the Millville election ballot.

Houle was the high vote-getter with 242 votes, followed by Hurteau who garnered 126 votes. The runner-up candidate was Andrew Alaward, who received 175 votes.

There were also two write-in candidates for selectmen, each receiving one write-in vote. They were Gerald Finn and Scott Shea.

Elsewhere on the Millville ballot, unopposed candidate Caryn Downey Vernon was elected to a four-year Millville seat on the Blackstone-Millville Regional School Committee with 253 votes, while unopposed candidate Jack R. Keefe was elected to a four-year Blackstone seat on the Blackstone-Millville Regional School Committee with a total of 239 votes.

There are several unopposed incumbent candidates on the ballot, including: • Dustin Ciccarelli, Board Health, 244. • Brian P. Mullaly, Highway Surveyor, 243.

• Michelle J. Dumond, Planning Board, 224.

• Pamela A. Thistle, Board of Library Trustees, 258. • Alex B. Mullaly, Tree Warden, 245. • Richard Hurteau, Trustee of Veterans Memorial Park, 244.