UPDATE 11:00 p.m. — Romano Wins Freeholder Race; Rent Control Not Repealed

11:00 p.m.—Hoboken's county incumbents won in Tuesday's elections, according to results coming out of the Hoboken City Clerk's office.

Freeholder Anthony Romano and Assemblyman Ruben Ramos Jr. were both re-elected.

Independent Freeholder candidate Kurt Gardiner got a total of 1,412 votes. Romano got 2,911 votes on the machines on Tuesday during the day. Romano got 616 vote by mail votes, Gardiner got 62 vote by mails.

Including vote by mail ballots, Ramos got 4,023 (3,387 on the machines) votes.

Hobokenites overwhelmingly voted "no" to repeal a rent control ordinance "yes" (3,349 "no" votes against 1,563 "yes" votes). Hobokenites also voted "yes" to legalize sports betting, with  2,815 against 1,306 votes.

At his headquarters at 321 Washington St., a tired Romano thanked his supporters.

"I'm very honored and humbled by the number of votes I received," Romano said. "Especially since the majority of the council endorsed my opponent."

Uptown, at , freeholoder candidate Kurt Gardiner sat around a table with a small group of loyal supporters, including political blogger Roman Brice and former councilman Tony Soares.

"I'm happy with the turn out," Gardiner said. He added he didn't expect to win in his first ever election. "This is good, it means my message resonated."

Gardiner already spoke to Romano on the phone, he said, congratulating him.

Gardiner said he enjoyed his first campaign, but was disappointed by the large number of vote-by-mail ballots in the Fourth Ward, the Southwestern part of town which includes the Hoboken Housing Authority.

"That needs an investigation," Gardiner said.

Downtown, on Third and Washington, a small group of HCDO supporters was gathering at Romano's headquarters, where Romano was still being congratulated by supporters.

"It's people like you guys that made it happen," he told his supporters, which included Council members Beth Mason and Tim Occhipinti as well as local developer Frank Raia and former Freeholder Maurice Fitzgibbons.

Earlier in the day, small groups of people held signs on street corners; others wearing white campaign T-shirts were sprinkled throughout town Tuesday afternoon as Hobokenites headed to the polls.

"This isn't a big, sexy election," said Ira Landgarten, who volunteered at a polling station in City Hall on Tuesday. Around 4 p.m., 86 people had voted there.

A few blocks up, in front of 321 Washington St., Assemblyman Ramos greeted people as they walked by and talked to his aide, Alex Habib.

Ramos said he wasn't nervous. "I get nervous around 7 p.m.," Ramos said. "No matter what."

According to Habib, roughly 35 campaign workers were working on Tuesday afternoon in the street promoting "Column A," the Hudson County Democratic Organization's candidates. Habib said also that turn out was lower than expected, even in parts of the city where Ramos has a strong base, he said.

"It's less than a school board (election)," Habib said about the turn out.