3 new councilors elected in Franklin

Emily Bieber Harris stood in front of Franklin High School for 11 hours on Oct. 6, from the moment the polls opened at 8 a.m. right up until they closed at 7 p.m.

She greeted voters on their way in and thanked them for coming out. In the evening, she and some other candidates gathered for a get-together to celebrate a job well done over their months of campaigning.

“It was pre-planned as like, ‘You know, what? It’s going to be over either way, and we should celebrate the work that we put in no matter what the outcome is,'” she said. “It just turned out that we were lucky enough to have it be a victory party.”

Bieber Harris is among the three newcomers who will occupy seats on the Franklin city council next year after voters across the city’s three wards cast their ballots on Oct. 6.

In Ward 1, Robert Desrochers Jr. beat out incumbent Tim Johnston, who served three years on the council. Lily Johnson gained two-thirds of the votes over John Demakowski to secure a three-year seat on the school board.

In Ward 2, Bieber Harris gained a majority of the votes over her opponents Glen Feener and Raymond Yonaitis. Stephen Pascucci won the school board race against Wesley Weyant, who told the Monitor before Election Day that he was no longer running.

“I felt like I was coming in from behind being the shortest-term resident of Franklin, and especially considering my opponents were so established on the community side,” Bieber Harris said. “I feel honored to do this. It’s a very great thing that I’ve been able to do, and I appreciate the community electing me.”

Both the Ward 3 city council and school board races were uncontested, paving the way for Stephanie Wolff to take the council seat and Lillian Machos to win a seat on the school board. However, a write-in campaign supporting current city councilor Ed Privé garnered a sizable one-third of all the votes.

Overall, between 18% to 24% of all eligible Franklin voters turned out to the polls.

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