Melrose Polls Quiet on Super Tuesday

Melrose is continuing a recent trend of low voter turnout, if poll numbers so far on are any indication.

Linda-Lee Angiolillo, Melrose election administrator, said this afternoon that the city is trending towards an 8-10 percent turnout.

"There's nobody—I cannot believe how slow it is right now," Angiolillo said in her office at City Hall.

The Boston Election Department reported on Twitter low turnout in Boston, too, as of noon—2.63 percent.

Melrose Patch asked on Twitter about the absence of volunteer signholders, who usually crowd the corners at Main and Upham Streets across from City Hall. DJ replied on Twitter, "We're reaching out to voters on the phones, emailing friends (and) tweeting."

In comparison, the last presidential primary in 2008 had a relatively good turnout in Melrose of 55 percent, but that race featured two hotly contested races for the Republican and Democratic presidential nominations.

Melrose's last election, the biennial city election this past November, had a 9.5 percent turnout, and there was only one contested race— In 2009's biennial city election, turnout was 17.5 percent, and in 2007, turnout was at 21 percent.

Today's turnout so far is "extremely low" for a presidential primary, Angiolillo said, who added the caveat that Melrose is a "Democrat city" and that there aren't any contested races on the Democratic ballot.

"They’re (Democrats) calling me and going, 'Is there a ballot?'" she said. "The Democrats didn’t really advertise anything."

Angiolillo added that Melrose's unenrolled independent voters generally pull Democratic ballots in primary elections.

"A lot of them (unenrolled voters), going by my absentees (ballot requests), are pulling Republican," she said. "I think it’s because they want to vote against someone—'I didn't like him so I’m going to vote for him, even though I know in November I’m going to vote Democrat.' They’re doing it just to get out and maybe get someone else off or give someone else a little bit of a boost, I think."

In the Aldermanic Chambers at City Hall, poll workers were reading books, magazines and newspapers as few voters trickled in. Poll Warden Marie Ryan said that the mid-afternoon, when children are picked up from school by parents, may bring a boost in numbers, but turnout was still low.

"I think it is a little slower than they expected," Ryan said. "They didn’t really know what to expect—we had our trainings (for poll workers) and we were talking about it. The primaries are never loaded anyway.

"It’s kind of too bad—kind of apathetic. It really is."

Angiolillo said the test will be after people leave work for the day and, having seen the news that a primary is being held today, they turnout at the polls.

"I’m not holding out hope, but it's got to get better," she said. "I’m hoping we get 20, 25 percent."