Any way you look at it, this was a landslide win, even if South Shore Tech’s Superintendent-Director Dr. Thomas J. Hickey, declined use that word at the risk of appearing to be “spiking the football,” but he is grateful to voters and pleased with the result.
“The term has been used and I think it’s around 77 percent overall,” he said of the “L-word,” on Monday, Jan. 27 of a ballot question before voters of SST’s nine member towns on Saturday, Jan. 25 to build a new South Shore Tech High School. “If you drill into the numbers, town-specific, the other big headline is that all nine towns approved it, even though that was not a necessary threshold.”
Turnout was low – in single digits for Whitman and Hanson, but Hickey found many reasons for encouragement.
“It’s so interesting, when you look at each town, there’s a story behind it,” Hickey said. “When I look at Cohassett and Norwell, I see two towns that send very few kids, and I would not have expected that big of a turnout.” Scituate, where the margin of victory for the project was 995, just voted for a new elementary school project.
“And here’s Whitman, [approving] a new middle school and DPW building,” he said. “We’re the third in line and, while the turnout was lower, the fact that it was in the affirmative, that was an extra special feeling, knowing the sacrifice folks are making to support this investment.”
He said the building should meet the needs of vocational education for the next 50 or 60 years; and the district is not going to lose sight of what voters did as SST moves forward with annual budgets and with this project.
“Wherever there are ways that we can curb costs – that also includes continuing to advocate to our legislative delegation that the state could still help by increasing money for equipment grants … adding more reimbursement for vocational schools,” Hickey said. “We can’t let up on the advocacy for making these schools more affordable.”
He also expressed appreciation for the legislative delegation’s bipartisan support for the project. Hickey expressed as much humility and appreciation as he did joy in the results.
“I feel profound gratitude over the support that’s throughout our district,” he said. “It says that people believe in the value of vocational education as a necessary investment for these trade areas… but I am also fully aware that voters despite difficult economic times and despite competing capital demands and looming operational overrides. It means so much to have the support.”
Supporters of the project were out in force online and outside polling places as residents in the SST district’s nine member towns voted. On a day when the temperature never climbed out of the 20s, the sun helped warm up the 150 members of the school’s alumi association, members of the Construction & General Labor Union Local 721 out of Brockton, parents and students, as they fanned out to their sign-holding posts.
“We’re the alumi,” Mark Consiglio of Whitman and Meghan Bickford [using her maiden name so her automotive classmates would recognize her] said in unison, as they held signs in front of the Dunkin Donuts next door to Whitman Town Hall.
“This has been over a year in the making, with meetings and everything,” Bickford said of the organizing the alumni group has done. “We’ve been doing meetings and calls.”
Before they even hit the streets, however, voters had been greeted that morning with a text message reminding them to vote and providing a link to information on the locations of the polling places.
“I was able to go to all of the polling places throughout the day and it was very gratifying that our supporters in our community were willing to stand out in 30-degree weather and just put a personal face on support for the school,” Hickey said.
Turnout, however, especially during the morning was “very, very slow,” according to Town Clerk Dawn Varley. In the end, only 5.8 percent – 1,771 voters of the town’s 11,930 eligible voters cast ballots in Whitman.
“Can I say it one more time? It’s been very slow,” said Assistant Town Clerk Michael Ganshirt.
Hanson Town Clerk Elizabeth Sloan said the turnout is “busier than we thought.”
There were 60 absentee votes cast. Hanson, which gave the building project a winning margin of 471 votes (543 voting yes and 72 voting no), did so with only 7 percent of voters casting ballots.
“More than I thought,” said Assistant Town Clerk Jean Kelly.
Hickey said he did some numbers crunching on his own and, while he doesn’t claim to have the right answer, but based on the town results, going back over four years of local election results, in most of the SST district towns, the turnout numbers probably rivaled the results on ballots where, “the only contested race was cemetery commission” or something.
“If you compare that turnout to a town meeting – even a high-octane town meeting – I think it’s good that this process probably engaged more people, through absentee ballot and same-day voting, as perhaps a town meeting,” he said.
At the entrance to the Maquan School driveway, SST Junior Graphic Arts student, Nathan Osso, said his SkillsUSA program advisor asked students to volunteer as a civics exercise. They also participate in volunteer efforts to bolster community efforts like toy drives and collections for food pantires.
Sign-holders in both towns reported many thumbs-up from motorists and positive comments from passersby.
“We’ve had a lot of people come in today,” Nathan said, explaining how much hope it gave him. “We’ve gotten some thumbs up, whistles, honks.”
“I think it’s going to do good,” said Jane Sayce of Hanson, who was on duty with her sign since 8:45a.m., along with middle her son, Brody. “I think it’s a good turnout.”
Both were dressed for the occasion in SST sweatshirt to spread school pride, especially since Brody and another one of her younger sons plan to attend SST in the future, as their older brother does now.
“We feel positive electronics alum Consiglio, who now works audio/visual in the entertainment industry said. “A lot of the turnout here has been very positive. There’s a couple of towns that are worried about the tax increase, but either way there’s a tax increase. A “yes” vote is for a new school and a “no” vote is for the repairs.”
“It’s evenly divided between all the towns,” said Consiglio.
SST School Committee representative, and Select Board member, Dan Salvucci, though, expressed uncertainty mixed with hope, but he forecast a close race of it in Whitman, Abington and Rockland. All three are at the top of the enrollment figures and stood to have to be contributing more toward a new school.
“I hope it passes,” he said. “I don’t know. I’ve been posting a lot on Facebook. I haven’t said, ‘Please vote for it,’ I don’t tell them what to do.”
Outside and down the street from Whitman Town Hall, the Local 721 Laborers were putting in some volunteer time sign-holding.
“We’re [here] just as a union,” said Mike Pidgeon of Lakeville. “If they go with [the school] that’s more work for us. We get work either way, but we get more work if they go with a new one.”
He also spoke about the importance of vocational education and the trades in the workforce.
“You’ll have more courses available for the kids and you’re getting everything new while you don’t have to live out of trailers,” he said of portable classrooms that were briefly considered for the expanding school enrollment. “In the long run, it’ll save you money.”
Pidgeon attended Southeastern Tech when he was in high school in 1976.
“I went for plumbing and never really got into that, but now I know how to do it. But I’ve been in the trades for over 50 years,” he said, noting that the trades are a work segment that is not vulnerable to being replaced by AI.
“They’re always going to need the trades,” he said. “More people are going to trade schools than colleges. You don’t have a guarantee when you get out.”
“I hope it goes ‘Yes,’” said Jim Rich of Foxboro. “That’s why we’re here, holding signs. Vo-techs work. You go to college and get debt, or go to work and get paid to learn.”