good evening we're live and it's five twenty five your channel seventeen town meeting television where we have been focusing on the twenty eighteen general elections in fact we've been focusing on them not only throughout the month of october where we hosted thirty one debates and one hundred candidates but also throughout the primary so tonight is a big night as we look forward to election day and that is tomorrow the sixth of november and we hope that you have had the opportunity or will have the opportunity to vote because of course that is a great privilege that we all share and it's very even though you may feel like it doesn't matter it does and there are some really important races so i'm going to recap some of those races that we're watching here at channel seventeen and tomorrow night at seven thirty we will go live with our election results program this is an election results program we've been doing since one nine hundred ninety when we started channel seventeen so that's about twenty eight years ago and we were in a smaller studio with a smaller staff but it was equally exciting so we're glad you're here to join us if you have any comments or questions or anything you want to raise here on the program for the next few minutes feel free to call us at eight six to three nine six six we're always glad to hear from our old friends and new here at channel seven ten meeting television so tomorrow night diane meyerhoff and she taught and will be here to talk about the election results and we will be bringing live footage live streaming interviews from the campaign parties that is the republicans in the democrats will be meeting here in burlington to review the results and celebrate the outcomes and the progressives well also be in burlington i believe it fully knows to be looking at the results and celebrating the outcomes so for governor we're looking at a race with governor phil scott the incumbent and he's being challenged by christine hall qwest a democrat and also a slate of other independent and third party candidates many of whom have been very vocal about being included or not included in that in the debates that were sponsored by various media organizations of course here channel seventeen we invite everyone and so we had some very interesting forums with the candidates for governor and all the statewide and local races so the statewide races include the governor's race lieutenant governor we have david zuckerman who is our incumbent being challenged by don turner who is the senate is the house minority leader and also the town manager of milton he's been running a fairly spirited campaign bringing his family on the campaign trail and they they are the top two folks that we are going to be watching and then we go down to some of the other statewide races which include secretary of state jim condo's is running and let's let's have a look at who he's running against you know the language of elections is an interesting one peter diamond stone the late great peter diamond stone liberty in canada a perennial candidate who passed over this past year always said we are running races and we're not running for election so the words sometimes are hard to find as alternatives and i tend to agree with with that but we're going to be using the verbs running and competing against so as i mentioned secretary of state jim condos is being challenged by mary alice hiebert who is again a longstanding liberty union party member we have a state treasurer beth pierce who is a democrat and she is running against richard morton a republican i don't think he  was able to make it one of our debates and of course you can watch if you want to get educated fast take a care crash course tonight or tomorrow you can of course come to our web site or you tube channel and channel seventeen and channel seventeen t seventeen t v and watch all of these forms because as i said we've had them all on our rate so the attorney general t j donovan the incumbent democrat is being challenged by rosemary to koski liberty union and jansen will from a republican now the races that we really are concerned about and look at here of course the statewide races there's no question but there are the county wide races and let me just mention i did forget that there is a u s senate election and a congregational action and peter welch is our incoming congressman a democrat and he is being challenged by chris erickson an independent who is also running for governor laura potter liberty union candidate and the new tiny tin nino a republican sorry about that and then of course senator bernie sanders is running for a six year term for reelection he's running as an independent although i imagine he will be of the democratic party tomorrow night and he is being challenged by a series of people fall aside they are do adela la and independent russell best in independent bruce independent gilbert state senate the state level the county level races are the ones that we are particularly concerned with here in the burlington area the chit and county region and there are six state senate positions open there currently occupied by democrats they're being challenged by seven additional combination of republicans and independents and so when you go into the polling booth you're going to see thirteen names some of them you or be familiar with and others that may seem entirely new to you so that's a state senate race and then of course probate judge an assistant judge which are the two other competitive county races for probate judge the incumbent gregory glennon he's a democrat is being challenged by bill maher for as a republican and that means seem odd to you the bill norful who's a former rip democratic mayor of wineskin would be running as a republican but he did not win the primary and so he opted to run again as a republican so that will be a race to watch along with assistant judges similar thing happened we call them side judges or system judges these are folks that work a lot with family court and they help the judges work on a variety of processes and we primary and i've opted to run not as democrats in this election but charlie delaney is a progressive republican and zachary york as a progressive so they've both been endorsed by the progressive and so that will be an interesting race to watch and then of course we have scavenged loughlin who is running unopposed as sheriff and daniel gamblin who is running unopposed as high bailiff and sarah george who is running unopposed as state's attorney and that's saying oh it must be at the bottom of this is are along the ballots these are super long ballots now in their house races all over the county and there are several contested ones and the ones that i can speak to just off the top of my head include in in willesden we have the incumbents there terry mckay and jim acosta who are being challenged by kathleen wineskins not exactly a contested race but it certainly will be one that takes a little time to get the results on because we have the onegin solace who is a progressive democrat and she was a seat mate with won that race last march and those that write in of how colston will be interesting to see if he gets more votes in columbus and that is on the ballot and also just so everybody  knows because it's a write in it will probably slow down the burlington results as we gather them because part of that district in ward one of burlington and part of it is in this case so those will take a little longer to come i understand that many of the absentee ballots were counted today in polling places all across the state the early voting numbers have been quite high and that's very exciting that we have such high participation or let's hope that we have hybrids and sometimes those absentee ballots  done on election day and they tend to slow down the results tallies after seven o'clock so in essex there are also a couple of contested races that are important to pay attention to linda miers who is been in the sea for essex i think since nineteen zero two thousand and one i have my notes right here she's in a three way race for two seats so there are two seats in district a one in essex linda meyers is who is he's run before he says but i couldn't find when so maybe somebody out there might remember that in cold chester there's also two contested races in culturist or nine one jim condon former representative and good friend of ours who passed away this year very sadly his seat is open and curtail or who's the democrat is running is faced by seth chase democrat and two republican challenger end up clark sweeney both republicans and in district nine to maureen daken is stepping down after many years of service i think twenty one years and patrick brennan is run running for reelection and there are three other candidates pamelor anja who won the nomination in the primary she had a write in vote and she the folks that were on the ballot but there was a there was a recount very dramatic and then her downing who's a long time colchester residence read austin they're both running as democrats and then in milton that's a race that is not that for billiard to me but there's an incumbent chris maddow who's a republican and he is there's two seats and john powell sick and todd buick are running also to get one of those two seats all three of them to see in grand isle mitzi johnson who is the head of the house there's a word for that it's escaping me at the moment she's the speaker of the house she is being opposed by two cousins who are related to don turner and milton and so judge ben joseph was a regular here on our show mitzi johnson those are the two incumbents and then there's two others who are specifically trying to unseat nancy johnson on  is particularly concerned on gun rights issues and that's what inspired her to vote so we'll be watching that as well and then let's just see what else we've got oh in burlington of course we have we have we have six races but only one is contested and that's in the new north and that's word for and word seven will be voting on that recurs right the incumbent republican just endorsed by the democratic mayor burlington is running with first term legislator carol who's a democrat and bob hooper who's a democrat and there are two seats open there and then in south bronx in john quacky former executive director of the flint theater and is running with you as a democrat and frank davis is running as a progressive for helen hence the seat helen had had that seat two thousand and three and i mention wellston so i think that we have touched on all the major races that we are watching here of course there are some valid questions on the ballot questions are always interesting and certainly important and the most important ones really well i am saying most important because they loom the largest as a to improve burlington high school and then there are revenue bonds for improving the wastewater and storm water utility projects and that adds up to about one hundred million dollars so it'll be interesting to see how brilliant and voters vote on those they're fairly expensive legacy capital projects that will only unfold over many years and one escape there is a simple ballot question that has to do with giving some flexibility around the time in the date of the school districts annual meeting so that would be it and then in south burlington there are several interrelated ballot questions that have to do with moving the municipal office to the new a new downtown location in city center and leasing that property to the school district and then the school district has related about questions that allow them to take a lease so there's sort of this land swap in south burlington and richmond there is about question to adopt the ten plan i think there is one other one but let me just see if i have those here please call chester to authorize colchester school district to convey land parcel to the town so those are really the ballot questions we will also be watching here in trenton county so once again our election results program starts tomorrow night at seven thirty here will be live with interviews from the democratic and republican parties in in burlington and we will also have in studio b our commentators on the state and national elections brady tensing and kevin ellis who give a good counterbalance to what's happening result of the elections tomorrow night and kevin and brady will be talking about that and of course here in studio a we will have diane meyerhoff who leads our results she'll be joined by she totten and then seth leonard and some others over the course of the evening so we really hope that you will tune in and watch the elections and you can go to see it seventeen dot tv to look at our election results because we will be collecting those results as we report them we will be reporting those results as we collect them here with the help of clerks and poll watchers all across and county prove with whom we could not do this program so we are very grateful to the probably two dozen people that helped make our results program reality and i'd just like to give a very warm thank you to the staff here at channel seventeen tunning meeting television who have provided such incredible and extensive coverage and to the candidates who have willingly come on the air and talked about what it is that is important to them it is quite moving as a moderator to be at a table with candidates some experienced and some not so experience who are willing to say what they think and stand behind it as a matter of political principle it's very powerful to hear that and see that and we are very appreciative we can help keep the wheels of democracy turning we think of ourselves as the grease monkeys of democracy so thanks so much for watching and thanks kevin for being in the booth and we'll see you tomorrow night at seven thirty here a channel seventeen town meeting television