BETHEL — Travel about this Windsor County town of 1,942 residents and many people will tell you it’s a political bellwether, with local results echoing top-of-the-ticket state totals in 23 of the last 24 elections.
So why on the eve of Tuesday’s Vermont primary will you find surprisingly few lawn signs for candidates or causes?
And the post office recycling bin full of unread campaign flyers?
And everyone at Main Street’s Central Market, sandwich shop, hair salon and laundromat talking about anything but the vote?
“We need rain,” one clerk said.
Then again, don’t let the seeming drought of public interest fool you. Even in the height of summer vacation season, residents here remain hot about their place in the process.
“It’s on the higher end of average,” Town Clerk Pamela Brown said of early voting, “with perhaps a bigger turnout coming because of everything that’s going on.”
A healthy 10% of Bethel’s 1,500 registered voters have requested absentee ballots — all while grumbling about grievances ranging from the high courts to the even higher cost of living.
“People are not happy,” Brown said while helping two early balloters. “The only way you can make things change is to vote. If people are going to do so, this is the time.”
A time, the town clerk knows, that’s more conducive to vacations. Vermont for decades scheduled its primary for September, but moved it to August in 2010 to meet a federal requirement that residents in the military or overseas receive ballots 45 days before the November vote.
Statewide, the newer summer primary draws only about half the number of people who vote in the fall general election. This year, more than 50,000 of Vermont’s nearly 500,000 registered voters have requested early ballots that will winnow down the field for open seats for U.S. Senate and House, lieutenant governor, attorney general, treasurer and secretary of state, in addition to local races.
“There has not been this many open statewide and federal seats at any time in recent history,” retiring Secretary of State Jim Condos has told the press.
Vermonters can vote Tuesday, with polling places, hours and candidate information available through VTDigger’s 2022 Election Guide.
Not everyone is enthusiastic, as evidenced by one market customer, who growled about politicians on his way out the door. But a steady stream of early voters at the town clerk’s office attested to plenty of neighbors ready to express themselves in gentler ways.
Said resident Stephen Morris upon casting a ballot: “This is my way to make a statement.”
