Nearly Half Of Reading Voters Cast Ballots In Recall Election

READING, MA — Nearly half of registered voters in Reading cast ballots in the recall election, and the town saw higher than usual turnout for the state primary, Town Clerk Laura Gemme said. Turnout for the recall was 48.3 percent – 9,750 ballots cast – while primary turnout was 50.2 percent – 10,140 ballots cast. There are 20,185 registered voters in Reading.

Of the more than 8,000 recall and primary mailed to voters, 5,727 mail-in ballots were returned for the primary and 5,424 were returned for the recall. Early voting efforts were also robust, with 1,282 primary and 1,219 recall ballots cast. On Election Day, there were 3,131 primary ballots and 3,107 recall ballots cast in person.

The petition to recall Select Board member Vanessa Alvarado ultimately did not pass.

"I want to thank all the volunteers for helping with mailing out all the vote-by-mail ballots and all the High School students that helped with the vote-by-mail ballots, early voting, and election day operations," Gemme said in a statement. "We had a tremendous response of new and experienced election staff stepping up to work Election Day, especially during a pandemic. This election period was a success because of the volunteers and staff and is a testament to the strong team we have here in Reading."

Gemme expects that turnout will be higher for the presidential election Nov. 3. Election staff and volunteers will begin preparing for the election the first week of October. Continued health protocols, as well as mail-in voting and early voting, will be available as part of the Safe Voting 2020 project.

Voters with questions about their voter registration status can check here: https://www.sec.state.ma.us/VoterRegistrationSearch/MyVoterRegStatus.aspx and track their ballot here: https://www.sec.state.ma.us/wheredoivotema/track/trackmyballot.aspx. Other questions should be directed to the Town Clerk's office at 781-942-9050.

Click here for the Primary Results and the Recall Results.