Somerset County tallies into night

PITTSFIELD – The first town in Somerset County to report its vote tally Tuesday night was Dennistown Plantation, which had all of its votes counted by 7:15 p.m.

“We knew who the four people were that weren’t voting, so we were able to finish counting with a voter turnout of 86 percent,” Town Clerk Rayle Gourd said.

The trend of a large voter turnout was repeated throughout the county, with many towns still counting votes long after midnight. Three of the county’s major towns – Skowhegan, Madison and Pittsfield – had not processed their votes by 12:30 p.m. and counting absentee ballots was one delaying issue.

In Pittsfield, Town Clerk Yvonne Mailman said that she processed 120 absentee ballots during the last presidential election. On Tuesday, she counted more than 350.

Early returns, however, showed that upsets were possibly in the making and that voters were not splitting their votes, but voting along party lines.

In towns such as Norridgewock, all Democratic candidates swept the polls, while in others, such as tiny Dennistown, the Republicans won each race.

In an unusual situation, all three county commissioners’ seats were up for grabs, and veteran Commissioner Tracey Rotondi, the commission chairman, was trailing challenger Richard Dunphy 2-to-1 at midnight.

Philip Roy of Fairfield, who challenged veteran Commissioner Zane Libby, took his hometown by a wide margin, but the situation was reversed in Libby’s hometown of Norridgewock.

County Treasurer Andrea Reichart was losing to challenger Louise Greenier, but with all but the largest towns reporting, Reichart was behind by only 49 votes, at 5,559 to 5,510.