Sciortino sticks to it; campaign breaks 24-year drought
Medford Transcript, by Nell Escobar Coakley
Sep 25, 2008
When a state court turned down his appeal to place his name on the ballot in September, plenty of people around told Carl Sciortino he'd never win a sticker campaign. After all, the last successful bid was in 1984.
"After I panicked, I had to figure a way to get on the ballot," said Sciortino, who on Sept. 16 defeated former Somerville alderman Bob Trane 2,678 to 2,218 in the 34th Middlesex District race. "There were a lot of people who thought it was a done deal."
On Nov. 6, 1984, challenger Salvatore Albano lost with a sticker campaign to incumbent representative Vincent Piro during the general election -- by three votes. Albano asked for a recount, which took place on Nov. 24 and 25.
In the end, Albano recovered 221 votes, making the final tally 10,442 to 10,221. Albano, who now lives in Methuen, could not be reached for comment as of press time Tuesday evening.
The impossible win is still something Sciortino said was pointed out to him many, many times. He said he received a lot of advice, but there was always the usual "it can't be done" attitude.
"A lot of people told me not to bother," he said. "But I proved four years ago that I can pull together a campaign and do what's necessary to win."
Sciortino gathered volunteers -- lots of volunteers -- about 400 of which were out at the polls primary day, wearing bright green shirts and handing out stickers for voters who either forgot theirs or were making up their mind for the first time.
At the beginning of the summer -- after working his way through the legal system to place his name on the ballot after a number of his certified signatures were taken from his State House office in the spring -- the incumbent stated knocking on doors. In a district that includes in both precincts in wards 4 and 5; Ward 7 Precinct 1; and Ward 8 Precinct 2 in Medford and Ward 4, both precincts, and all precincts in Ward 7 in Somerville, Sciortino managed to hit 6,000 households.
"About 4,000 of those people said they'd support me," he said. "The last few days, I started to get really anxious that they were going to use the stickers correctly, but my campaign team was very good."
And that was the secret.
While it was all well and good to talk issues, Sciortino said his team was in fact running two campaigns -- familiarizing voters with the stickers and with him.
"In this case, it was did I deserve to be elected and did they know how to vote," he said. "It was really two very intense efforts all summer long."
Sciortino said multiple mailings were sent out, flyers were left on doorsteps and there was a Web site set up, all of which showed voters what to do and how to do it. And it was also important to bring stickers to the polls.
The efforts paid off.
"It was an incredibly well-organized campaign," said Medford City Clerk Ed Finn. "They got their message out because the stickers on the ballots were clean. People put on the sticker and filled out the ovals. A lot did both and that was great, especially for counting purposes."
Finn said Medford officials went through every ballot, hand counting the write-ins. Most of the precincts didn't come back with their final tallies until after midnight.
"Carl did an unbelievable job in getting those stickers out," Finn said. "In the Registrar's race, there were a lot more write-ins and it was difficult because so many were handwritten. It makes it harder on a city or town because you have to figure out what the voter intent is."
But wardens were ready, Finn said, mostly because of intense training they received in preparation for the sticker campaign.
Finn said all the results are still unofficial and will be until the 10-day period for a recount has come and gone on Sept. 25. At that point, all the absentee ballots will also be accounted for.
While Sciortino faces no further opposition in the general Nov. 4 election, he said won't allow himself to make the same mistake of leaving certified signatures in his office. He said this election really taught him that while he had a lot going for him, given his record, it's extremely difficult to run a sticker campaign.
And then there are the leftovers.
"I've got about 20,000 stickers left," he said. "I'd say I have address labels for life."