Newport passes wool mill cleanup funding, elects Sayer to selectboard

By Jordan J. Phelan
Staff Writer
NEWPORT — Voters in Newport overwhelmingly passed all 14 articles on the Town Meeting ballot on Tuesday while Keith M. Sayer narrowly defeated Bert Spaulding Sr. in the lone competitive race, according to results provided by Newport Town Clerk Liselle Dufort.

Nearly 4,500 total votes were cast across 420 ballots at the Towle School on Main Street in Newport between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m.

Some of the articles passed included $500,000 to help remediate the nearly 4-acre former Hartford Woolen Mill property; an $11 million budget for the 2021 fiscal year, three-year collective bargaining agreement with the Newport public works union; and two bonds requesting $1.3 million for land acquisition and water system upgrades on Unity Road and $700,500 to reconstruct three roadways.

Nine votes are all that separated Sayer and Spaulding Sr. for the open three-year term seat on the Newport Selectboard currently held by Todd Fratzel. Spaulding Sr. currently serves on the Newport School Board.

Each article passed with an approval percentage ranging from 71.1% — in the case of Article 16, to raise and spend $4,000 to support Visiting Nurse and Hospice for Vermont and New Hampshire — to 89.6% — in the case of Article 5, to raise and spend $700,500 for the road construction project.

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Editor’s Note: This article has been amended to reflect the fact that 420 ballots were cast and counted in Tuesday’s election, not nearly 1,000 as the original article published in the Wednesday, May 12, edition of The Eagle Times reported. That figure was calculated by adding in two spoiled ballots and 568 unused ballots.