WESTFIELD – In a close race for the Republican nominee in the State House 4th Hampden district, which covers Westfield, Kelly Pease, a retired U.S. Army officer and legislative aide to former state Sen. Donald F. Humason Jr., edged out City Councilor Dan Allie.
Unofficial results on the night of the election had Pease with a 117 lead over Allie, with several last-minute mail-in ballots that had been counted by the precincts left to be added to the totals, along with some provisional ballots that needed to be researched for voter registration status. “That’s very normal, and is part of the process and procedure,” Fanion said.
Later in the evening, when the auxiliary mail-in ballots arrived at City Hall, Fanion said the Republican votes were split evenly among the two candidates and did not change the outcome. “There were 19 Republican Auxiliary ballots, Allie got 6 votes, Pease got 6 votes and there were 7 blanks,” Fanion said.
Pease will face Democratic candidate Matthew J. Garlo, who received 472 votes in the primary, and Independent Ethan Flaherty in the Nov. 3 election.
For the U.S. Senate, Westfield Democrats favored Joseph P. Kennedy, III over incumbent Edward J. Markey, with a vote of 3,540 to 2,701; and Republicans voted for Kevin J. O’Connor over Shiva Ayyadurai, 1,753 to 1,316, according to the Sept. 1 unofficial results.
Westfield Democrats also chose incumbent Richard E. Neal over Alex B. Morse, 3,748 to 2,517 for the U.S. House. There were no Republican candidates for the seat.
Democrats supported incumbent State Senator John C. Velis with 5,760 votes, while Republicans cast 2,489 votes for John Francis Cain. Both names will be on the ballot on Nov. 3 for the State Senate seat.
