Newton voters think that they should have veto power over the sale of city-owned land, and that local communities should have more say on affordable housing projects, according to the results of two nonbinding Election Day ballot questions.
In other communities across Greater Boston, voters registered their nonbinding support for legalizing marijuana, putting more controls on nonhospital abortion providers, and requiring municipal utilities to adopt fair policies for homeowners who install solar panels.
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While the governor’s race and other high-profile statewide contests captured much of the limelight Nov. 4, voters also weighed in on a variety of state and local issues through nonbinding public policy questions in a handful of legislative districts, and binding questions in a few communities.
In Walpole and Swampscott, voters rejected requests for temporary property tax increases that would have financed major municipal building projects. The Swampscott proposal would have helped fund a new townwide elementary school. Holbrook voters, on the other hand, embraced a $47 million Proposition ½ override to help build a prekindergarten-Grade 12 school.
The questions in Newton appeared on the ballots of two House districts that together encompass most of the city.
The measures call for state legislation requiring a majority of voters in a city or town to approve the sale of any municipally owned land of more than 7,500 square feet, and giving local officials “binding input” on density, parking, and other features of projects proposed under Chapter 40B, the state’s affordable housing law.
Sarah Quigley, a member of a residents’ group that proposed the questions, said they sprung from concerns in Newton about two issues: the city’s history of selling schools and other properties that would be very valuable today, and a recent flurry of 40B proposals seen as out of scale with their neighborhoods.
‘This shows, not only to our state reps but also to our city officials, how the residents stand on these issues.’ – Sarah Quigley, advocate for Newton ballot questions on housing, city property
“This shows, not only to our state reps but also to our city officials, how the residents stand on these issues,” she said of the election results.
More than 70 percent
of residents in the state House district that encompasses Cohasset, Hingham, and Hull, and part of Scituate voted to back the question urging fair solar power policies by municipal utilities, including those in Hingham and Hull.
The measure calls for legislation requiring municipal utilities to adopt the same laws on net metering — the energy credits provided to homeowners who generate some of their own electricity — as those pertaining to investor-owned utilities, and to adopt rates and policies that do not discriminate against those residents.
Hingham resident Roger Freeman, a member of the group that proposed the question, called it a response to policies by the Hingham and Hull light departments that seem unfair to residents with solar panels.
“It is time for municipal utilities to step up their game and bring rates and policies into line with those applying to the 85 percent of Massachusetts citizens served by investor-owned utilities,” he said in a statement.
Of the region’s nine binding questions decided on Nov. 4
, four were proposals to override Proposition 2½, the state law that limits the annual growth of property taxes.
Holbrook voters approved a debt-exclusion override, which raises property taxes for the length of time it takes to pay off a loan, in support of a plan to construct a single facility to replace the town’s three aging elementary schools. Holbrook will pay about $47 million of the overall $103 million project, with the state covering the rest.
“I’m just so grateful that the voters value education and they want to help the children of Holbrook,” said the school district’s superintendent, Patricia Lally.
In Franklin, voters rejected a $1.5 million override that would have permanently raised property taxes to pay for roadway, sidewalk, and drainage projects.
Walpole voters rejected a debt-exclusion proposal to pay $21.2 million toward what would have been an overall $29.45 million program to build and revamp municipal buildings.
And in Swampscott, voters defeated a debt-exclusion override to pay for the town’s $35 million share of an approximately $52 million project to build a townwide elementary school.
The election brought mixed results for the Community Preservation Act,the state law that allows for a local property tax surcharge to fund affordable housing, recreation, open space and historical preservation projects.
Voters in Arlington and Boxborough approved their town’s adoption of the act, while residents in Newbury and Woburn rejected it, and Essex voters defeated a proposal to boost the local program’s tax
surcharge from 0.5 percent to 1 percent.
“We were thrilled,” said Susan Stamps, cochairwoman of the ballot committee that worked to have the program approved in Arlington. “Arlington is really a wonderful, vibrant community and the CPA will make it even better.”
Among the other nonbinding questions, voters in 10 House districts near Boston joined those in four other districts statewide in voting their strong support for legalizing marijuana.
“I’m jumping up and down for joy,’’ Bill Downing, a Reading resident who is treasurer of Bay State Repeal, said of the six questions proposed by his group and eight proposed by the Drug Policy Forum of Massachusetts. “We won everywhere, and in some cases got a vote that was unimaginably high.”
By strong margins, voters insix South Shore districts and 11 overall supported a ballot measure calling for legislation that would require nonhospital facilities performing more than 10 abortions a year to be licensed as clinics and inspected by the state.
“This issue is really one that both sides of the abortion debate can get behind, because it has to do with protecting the health and safety of women that use these facilities,” said Patricia Stewart, executive director of Massachusetts Citizens for Life, which proposed the question.
Voters in 18 districts, 15 of them in communities surrounding Boston, voted by large margins to support an amendment to the US Constitution affirming that human beings, not corporations, are entitled to constitutional rights, and that Congress and the states can limit political contributions and spending.
Lee Ketelsen of Acton, state coordinator of Move to Amend, a national group seeking the change, said the intent was to undo Citizens United and other Supreme Court decisions that have opened the door to unlimited spending on elections.
“Support for this amendment crosses a lot of ideological and political boundaries,’’ she said. “People want democracy returned to the individual voter.”
Voters in two House districts — including the one represented by House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo, a Winthrop Democrat — supported a question calling for political reforms including a prohibition on candidates for state and local office taking campaign contributions from industries regulated by those offices.
John Laidler can be reached at laidler@globe.com.Open all references in tabs: [1 – 4]