Is the Highschool Project in Trouble in Lancaster at the Polls Today?

Although 75% of Lancaster's voters at the special town meeting supported the school project, only 6% of the towns voters attended, half of the 11% in Stow and 12% in Bolton. In Stow's special election on Saturday, only 56% of voters supported the debt exemption -- a big drop in support from the 74% who supported the project at their Special Town Meeting.

Low special town meeting attendance in Lancaster might signal a problem

Voters at Lancaster's special town meeting approved Article 1, with 75% voting in favor.  That seemed like a landslide victory for the highschool vote at the time, but the low turnout for the meeting may not be an auspicious sign for the debt exclusion vote today.   Only about 6% of registered town voters attended the special town meeting in Lancaster;  11% attended in Stow and 12% attended in Bolton.

Stow voted on their debt exclusion on Saturday: that debt exclusion vote is necessary in each of the three towns so that they can pay for their portions of the future school debt assessments.   (The yearly school debt assessment for Lancaster will be more than $3 million and close to half of what Lancaster pays for all it's non-school payroll and expenses combined.)  The debt exclusion vote was a much closer in Stow, with 56% voting in favor where 74% had supported the project at their special town meeting.

Could the low special town meeting voter participation be a sign that support in Lancaster is more tepid? 

All three special town meetings were held on the same night, so it's not clear why participation in Lancaster was so much lower.   It will be interesting to see how the election day turnout in Lancaster compares to the turnout in Bolton, who's also voting today.

Are there enough ardent project supporters in Lancaster to prevail in a much closer ballot vote today?  We'll soon find out.

What happens if the debt exclusion vote fails today?

I've read various theories on what a "No" vote on the debt exclusion would do.

Apparently (I was one of the 5000 Lancaster voters not at the meeting) the motion for Article 1 was made to approve the article contingent on the outcome of today's vote.  If that's a thing that's possible (I'm not sure) then a "No" today would nullify last weeks vote.   It wouldn't explicitly turn it into a "No", though -- it would just nullify it.

The School District Agreement doesn't require a "Yes" vote from the towns to take on debt.  It just requires that none of the three towns take a "No" vote in 60 days after being notified that the School Committee has voted to take on debt.   A few years ago the school committee approved borrowing for work on fields at the high school: Lancaster didn't call a meeting, much less take a vote on it -- 60 days without a "No" vote signals our tacit approval of the debt.

Where is this all spelled out?  Look at page 8 of the District Agreement which points to MGL Chapter 71 Section 16 (d).

You don't need to say "Yes",  you just need to not say "No."

So per the district agreement, if Lancaster really wanted to disallow the borrowing we'd have to hustle and schedule another town meeting to do so.  Otherwise voting "No" today might just leave us without a real way to pay our share the debt the district could still take on.

That said, the MSBA is involved and guiding the process -- they might have their own requirements and interpret a "No" today differently and end the project on their side.  Also, the school committee is made up of people, not androids, and presumably they would alter their plans accordingly.