The votes are in and John Rooney has won a seat on the Board of Selectman. Rooney received 1,002 votes to incumbent Sal Giorlandino’s 606.
In other contested races, Paul Cimino won a seat on the Planning Board over Andrew Mills, and Mary Lou Woodford won a seat on the Board of Health beating out Desheng Wang.
I’ll have more details on the blog tomorrow.
WOO-HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Congratulations to Mr. Rooney!!! And to the people of Southborough who have said “enough”. Good luck, John. :)
LET THE HEALING BEGIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Time for us this town to embrace the NEW LEADERSHIP!
Please join me in sincerely thanking Sal Giorlandino for his service. Serving in public is difficult at the best of times and particularly so at times like this. Mr. Giorlandino has devoted enormous amounts of personal time and energy to our Town and deserves unqualified thanks.
Those of us who supported John Rooney appreciate his willingness to volunteer and his great campaign effort.
All of us may reflect for a moment on the wisdom and sacrifice of those who gave us this wonderful system, and those who preserved it.
Thank you Sal for everything!
I agree. Thank you Sal.
Hello,
Congratulations to my colleagues John and Paul on their wins.
My best to Sal and my gratitude for his service to our Town.
Thanks to all that helped John Rooney and Paul Cimino win election. At times, it was awfully chilly at the polls today. From what I observed, the day did start with a chill and warmed up between the camps of supporters.
The more time we spent together, the more we realized that we are all after the same thing, to work to improve our hometown.
I met lots of good people today and throughout the Rooney campaign. Now, we need to focus on the difficult discussion and decisions to keep Southborough afloat and maintain services. I certainly wish John well in his new endeavor.
Thanks to Susan F. and her blog for allowing comments and for helping information flow. It’s been a long haul and I am hopeful that we can get back to work to frame the future of our Town.
Steve Morreale
Congratulations to Mr Rooney!! That was not a close contest! Thank you for running.
Congratulations as well to Mr Cimino and to Ms Woodford!
To all the candidates on the ballot, it takes a lot of time and dedication to volunteer your time, and as we have seen, it also can come at great cost and scrutiny. Having served and chaired on committees, I know it is not always easy. I thank you all for your service to the town.
Mr Giorlandino, thank you for all the ways you have served Southborough over the years.
Karen and I would also like to join John Butler in thanking Sal for his service, and wish him well. Sal has literally invested personal hours that total well into the thousands on behalf of Southborough and its citizens. Few can say that, and we should express our appreciation for that effort, an effort which can be quite thankless at times. John Butler always says these things better much than I do, and I also echo John’s thoughts above. We also congratulate John Rooney, wish him well, and remind him that he has an important job ahead.
My thanks to the voters of Southborough for your trust in electing me to represent you on the Planning Board. I am eager to continue my service to the Town in this new capacity, and look forward to getting started. My regards to Andrew Mills, who was a gracious opponent throughout the race.
I also want to congratulate John Rooney and his family on a well-earned victory, and I look forward to his service to the Town as Selectman. Best of luck, John!
Of course, both Sal Giorlandino and Chuck Connors deserve our gratitude for their dedication to the Town and willingness to serve for so many years. My best wishes to them.
Finally, a great thanks to Susan F. for providing such a useful forum for the people of our Town to exchange news, ideas and opinions. It is an enormous benefit to all of us.
Sincerely,
Paul Cimino
Southborough’s outside legal fees have dropped dramatically. maybe now we will find out what the real number was???……
Thanks for all of your coverage, Susan. I feel like I was an informed voter this time…
Congratulations to John Rooney and Paul Cimino!!
I too want to thank Sal Giorlandino for his years of service. It takes courage to stand in the public square and offer yourself to the voters and it is no fun to lose, I know. Political campaigns are bear knuckle events particularly when important issues are on the table as I believe they were this time. Regardless, Sal Giorlandino’s record of selfless service to the town, following his conscience as he saw best, is an example we should all respect and admire even if we disagree about where the best course of action lies. I hope we have not heard the last of Sal, diversity of thought and opinion is our strength.
Well said Al, very well said.
I’ll add my sincere thanks to Sal, and my congratulations to those who won–now the hard part begins!
In support of the remarks made by J Butler, S Morreale, K Muggeridge, R & K Challen, A. Hamilton, they hit the ‘nail on the head’. Many Town citizens are not aware of the work and time commitment involved when elected, appointed or volunteering to serve on a board. John Butler summed it up – “All of us may reflect for a moment on the wisdom and sacrifice of those who gave us this wonderful system, and those who preserved it.”
Karen Muggeridge’s comment – “To all the candidates on the ballot, it takes a lot of time and dedication to volunteer your time, and as we have seen, it also can come at great cost and scrutiny.” Most of us would say, ‘Who needs the aggravation’. Yet we have dedicated Townspeople who step forward.
To Sal – Thank you for your time, insight and dedication in your service to Southborough. Al Hamilton’s comment (blog – May 11, 7:28AM) says it the best! “It takes courage to stand in the public square and offer yourself to the voters —–. Political campaigns are bear knuckle events particularly when important issues are on the table—————-. Regardless, Sal Giorlandino’s record of selfless service to the town, following his conscience as he saw best, is an example we should all respect and admire even if we disagree about where the best course of action lies. I hope we have not heard the last of Sal, diversity of thought and opinion is our strength.”
To John Rooney – As Roger and Karen Challen wrote – “We also congratulate John Rooney, wish him well, and remind him that he has an important job ahead.” I look forward to working with you.
Sal will truly be missed. I never considered him anything but fair and dutiful to the law.
As a supporter of Sal Giorlandino during his term as Selectman and during this campaign, the results of this election were naturally disappointing. What is at least as disappointing, and possibly more so, is the fact that the respectful and civil tone of many of the posts above only emerged starting a few hours after the results were tallied.
I am not naïve to the fact that politics is not tiddlywinks, but I find it very disappointing to have seen the vitriolic and accusatory tone of the posts by many of Sal’s detractors on various threads of this blog prior to the election, only to have people seem to regain their memories as to Sal’s long, dedicated, and highly respectable service to this town a few hours after the vote count. To be fair, the comments of some of the posters above were not necessarily the most toxic ones, but many of them were highly accusatory and, in my opinion, contributed significantly to the overall highly negative tone.
There will be more elections and debates about various issues coming up in the future, and anyone who is sincere about ‘healing’ and doing what’s best for this town will commit to keeping the next one and all that follow vigorous but respectful and civil from the start and all the way through, rather than just in the aftermath.
The BoS has an executive session scheduled for Tuesday’s meeting, but in keeping with Bryan’s suggestions I’m not going to try to make scandal out of it.
C’mon, laugh! You gotta admit it’s ironic.