Sound file linked to above is in mp3 format.  Time:  5 minutes 17 seconds;  File size:  3.7 megaBytes.
The Constitutional Question didn't pass state-wide - but it did in Weston!
This 2014 election was by far the best-run election in Weston (and that's saying A LOT!!!).  Ever!  Great job!!!


CHECK THIS OUT NYTIMES FOR THE RESULTS FROM CT
And in the race for State Senate in the 26th District, incumbent Toni Boucher won going away...


FORUM updating story periodically here:  Who finally won, what were the numbers, in Weston?   League called it in to the FORUM at the earliest possible time 

IN THE DIM LIGHT...Voter turnout:  3648 (of 6042) or 57% - but we are sometimes numerically challenged on election night in a dim gym...make that over 60% by the time it was all over and all the ballots were counted. 

It has come to our attention that "EDR" which is not a disease nor is it a government program - EDR stands for ELECTION DAY REGISTRATION - permits and requires new voters to show up with proof of their identity with a picture and proof of their residence - is quite the extra work on Election Day for the Registrars of Voters.  Our source for this is from a larger community than Weston one that has multiple voting locations.

Governor/LtGov's race:  Foley

U.S. Congress 4th Distrct:  Himes

State Senate races:

26th - Boucher
28th - Hwang

• 'VOTE SHAMING' article;  75' rule violation?
  
• GO TO Absentee Ballot Request form (this is a two part process - you will be sent an absentee ballot when they are available) for November 4, 2014 Election
  
• GO TO Congressionl contest in the 4th
• GO TO CT State Senate contests

Norwalk HOUR story in full:
http://www.thehour.com/news/norwalk/registrars-investigating-possible-election-day-law-violations/article_b4d4fb11-280f-5908-b62c-5e84da1a3cb8.html

REGISTRARS' PUBLIC PREPARATIONS FOR ELECTION DAY VOTING WAS TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2014, 5:30-8PM IN TOWN HALL...

DEMOCRACY IS NOT A SPECTATOR SPORT - TAKEN TO A NEW LEVEL:  "VOTE SHAMING" (we know where you live...) TACTICS IN 2014.
What was this all about?  It was an opportunity to publicly set up the two (2) voting machines, test them both to make sure they not only counted the ballots the same, but were able to distinguish among the 6 different colored ballots!!!  At least, that's what I think was going on!  There will be two districts (#26 and #28, or "2" and "1") for either side of town, so that's one color each, then there is the Election Day Registration color (2?) and then...absentees, one color for #26 and one for #28??? 

SURPRISE!  We spoke to the Moderator when we voted after 11am and they will be reading off the results by Party after all!!!

Source:  http://www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-campaigns/absentee-and-early-voting.aspx

12 LWV in Region hold 4th District Debate at Wilton H.S.!!!


Don't forget to read about the two ballot questions at the Town of Weston website!
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Election Day Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014, 6am to 8pm, W.M.S. Gym.

The HOUR.   
Congressman Jim Himes and Dan Debicella debate in Wilton
By ROBIN SATTLER, Hour Staff Writer
Posted: Sunday, October 19, 2014 10:15 pm | Updated: 10:15 pm, Sun Oct 19, 2014.

WILTON -- Equal pay for women, job creation and immigration reform were just a few of the hot button topics discussed
during a debate at Wilton High School on Sunday between two-term Democrat incumbent Jim Himes and Republican
candidate Dan Debicella, for the U.S. House of Representatives 4th Congressional District.

Hosted by the Wilton League of Voters and 11 chapters of the League of Women Voters in Fairfield County, the debate
was the first of three currently scheduled in the race.

Moderator Kay Maxwell, a former president of the League of Women Voters of the United States and current executive
director of the Stamford-based World Affairs Forum, relayed the questions collected from the audience as well as those
prepared by League members and Wilton High School students...for story in full:  http://www.thehour.com/news/wilton/
congressman-jim-himes-and-dan-debicella-debate-in-wilton/article_c3239af9-17bd-59ec-aa72-1a6f80a4c054.html

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LWV OF WESTON 28th State Senate District Debate

28th CT State Senate District Debate one-line NOW!!!  ON WESTON CHANNEL 79 AT 5PM EVERY DAY!!!
A video of the debate can be watched via the links provided below.  The video is presented in two formats.  Windows Media
Player format (.wmv) is recommended for Windows users, and is best viewed via Internet Explorer, which will automatically
open Windows Media Player and begin playback without waiting for the entire file to download.  MP4 format (.mp4) is
recommended for Apple users.  Depending on the software that is being used, playback may not begin until the entire file has
downloaded, which may take several minutes or more depending on the speed of your Internet connection.

Windows Media Player format: 
http://www.lwvweston.org/LWVDebate10-11-14.wmv  (1 hour 20 minutes 50 seconds; 476 megaBytes)

MP4 format:
http://www.lwvweston.org/LWVDebate10-11-14.mp4  (1 hour 20 minutes 50 seconds; 367 megaBytes)

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The Madison Square Garden of Weston politics (above).

U.S. Congress 4th District rematch
These same two candidates faced off in 2010...

CT State Senate 26 & 28 Districts: 
With long time Senator for Weston (eastside) not running, LWV of Weston wanted to let our voters get a chance to ask questions with a Weston focus (since neither candidate is from Weston)!

Toni Boucher and Phil Sharlach, contesting in the 26th
Campaign Finance Reform Rally:  Kim Fawcett (l) and Tony Hwang (third from left), who are contesting for the 28th. 

(FYI - Both CT Senate Districts as well as other CT House Districts not involving Weston are debating in Westport  on Sunday, Oct. 8th;  Weston LWV debate ONLY for CT Senate 28th, on Oct. 11, 2014, a Saturday, at Weston Library at 10:30am to 12 noon.)

LWVCT wins!
DGA loses challenge, but can still support Malloy’s election
CT MIRROR
By: Mark Pazniokas | June 11, 2014

A federal judge's decision Tuesday leaves intact the state's regulatory authority over independent campaign expenditures by groups such as the Democratic Governors Association,  but it does not block the DGA from supporting the re-election of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy...read story in full here.

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TOWN CLERKS HAVE TWO WEEKS AFTER AUG. 6 TO VERIFY SIGNATURES...
Petitioning Candidates Reach Deadline, But Will They Qualify?
CTNEWSJUNKIE
by Hugh McQuaid | Aug 6, 2014 5:30am

Ahead of today’s 4 p.m. deadline to submit voter signatures, petitioning gubernatorial candidate Joe Visconti said he’s confident he will meet the signature threshold while Jonathan Pelto said he is encountering unexpected barriers in the process.

Pelto, a liberal blogger and former lawmaker, and Visconti, a conservative former West Hartford town councilman, are trying to petition onto the November gubernatorial ballot to challenge Gov. Dannel P. Malloy. Both need to collect the signatures of 7,500 voters in order appear on the ballot with Malloy and a Republican candidate. Each town clerk has two weeks to verify the signatures on the petitions submitted by today’s deadline.

By the deadline, Visconti said his campaign will have submitted between 10,300 and 10,500 signatures to local town clerks. He said he was confident that would give him an adequate buffer to ensure he appears on the ballot if some percentage of the signatures are rejected.

“I could not conceive of more than 30 percent [being rejected],” he said Tuesday afternoon. “I’m not worried at all, not one minute or one bit and I have no doubt I’ll be on the ballot.”

On Tuesday afternoon, Pelto said he was still “hopeful” he would make that threshold, but has found the process of getting voter signatures vetted by municipal and state officials cumbersome.

“Democracy is a messy thing. This system that they’ve created is more complex than simply going out and getting 7,500 names,” Pelto said, adding that the signature threshold itself was an appropriate policy. But he said the submission has been “complex, convoluted, and primitive. It hasn’t been updated in a long time.”

[Please read the rest of this article in the archives at the CTNEWSJUNKIE website]

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Maynard's recovery from injury leaves status of his Senate seat unclear as election nears
State lacks precedent for what to do if he is unable to withdraw
By Joe Wojtas Day Staff Writer
Article published Aug 6, 2014

With Election Day 13 weeks away, state Sen. Andrew Maynard's name continues to be on the ballot although he remains hospitalized after suffering a serious head injury at his Stonington home 15 days ago.

While residents, friends and party officials have been hoping the popular Democrat recovers from his injuries, some have begun to privately ask what happens to his 18th District seat if Maynard can't run in November or can't perform the duties of the office.

"These are uncharted waters," said Av Harris, the spokesman for the Connecticut Secretary of the State's Office on Tuesday.

He said that under state law, the only person who can remove a candidate's name from the ballot is the candidate.

Sources have said over the past two weeks that Maynard has not been communicating with the friends and relatives who have been keeping a 24-hour bedside vigil at Rhode Island Hospital.

[Please read the rest of this article in the archives at THE DAY (New London, CT) website]

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Nope.
Boughton-Lauretti ‘cautiously optimistic’ on petitions
CT MIRROR
By: Mark Pazniokas | June 10, 2014

Facing a deadline of 4 p.m., Mark Boughton’s gubernatorial campaign was “cautiously optimistic” Tuesday it had collected sufficient signatures to qualify his running mate, Mark Lauretti, for the Republican primary on August 12.

The campaign had collected more than the 8,190 required signatures, said Heath Fahle, a spokesman. But it was unclear how many would withstand the scrutiny of the validation process as registrars of voters check names against voter lists.

“We’re over the 8,200 or so that we need,” Fahle said. “The last couple of days, we’ve been working on a kind of buffer cushion. We're cautiously optimistic about where we are.”

Lauretti’s failure to qualify likely would be a fatal blow to Boughton’s campaign, denying him the fundraising partner Boughton needs to raise the $250,000 in small-dollar donations he needs to qualify for a public financing grant of $1.35 million for the primary.

Tom Foley, the 2010 nominee, was endorsed for the GOP gubernatorial nomination last month at the party’s state convention. Boughton, the mayor of Danbury, and Senate Minority Leader John P. McKinney of Fairfield, qualified for the primary by winning at least 15 percent of the delegate vote.

Lauretti, the mayor of Shelton, ended his gubernatorial campaign after the convention and agreed to form a ticket with Boughton.

If he qualifies, Lauretti will be one of four candidates for the lieutenant governor on the GOP primary ballot. The others are: Penny Bacchiochi, the endorsed candidate; David Walker, who is running with McKinney; and Heather Bond Somers. They qualified for the primary at the convention.

[Please read the rest of this article in the archives at the CT MIRROR website]

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June 10 - Will there be successful primary petitions filed for the 26th district?  And how about for state-wide offices?  No municipal offices up in Weston.

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