WESTFIELD — Robert Goyette won the June 18 special election for Ward 5 Municipal Light Board representative with 91% of the vote, according to official results released Thursday.
“I’m humbled by the landslide victory,” said Goyette.
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He received 528 out of the 581 total votes. Write-in candidate Kenneth McLean received 43 votes, 7% of the total. The remaining 2% of ballots went to other write-ins or were left blank. The 581 voters made up 10.5% of Ward 5′s 5,535 registered voters.
Goyette said he won because he worked hard during his campaign, and the voters of Ward 5 recognized that.
“I stood out on Election Day and was the only person out there with a sign, among my other supporters, but no other person was represented there,” he said. “I think they just recognized that I wanted it, I worked hard for it,” he said.
He thanked his family, friends and supporters. Asked if he wanted to say anything to McLean, he declined.
“The results showed who voters thought would be the best candidate,” he said.
McLean, a general manager for the maritime systems division of Raytheon, said he wanted to thank his supporters, Westfield voters in general, and everyone who encouraged him to run. Though he lost, he said he managed to spread awareness of himself and his leadership capabilities.
“It proved someone within 15 days can establish themselves as a competitor and has a compelling story to be one of the leaders in the city,” he said.
McLean is planning to take part in future elections, “maybe for the G&E, maybe for City Council,” he said. Next time, he said he will be on the ballot and will start campaigning earlier. He credited his loss to mail-in voters, whom he described as a significant portion of the vote, not seeing his name on the ballot and not knowing he was running.
He also said he discovered he had reach beyond Ward 5, and wanted to leverage that.
“We used the internet a lot, email, Facebook, and it was very humbling to me in a way that people had supported me so quickly and so strongly,” he said.
He shared that the elections he was interested in were next year, so he has time to prepare.
He congratulated Goyette on his win and wished him good luck.
As Ward 5 representative, Goyette will replace Joe Mitchell, who resigned in November to become Westfield Gas & Electric’s assistant general manager. His first meeting as a board member will be on July 10, he said.
“I’m looking forward to applying my skills and learning new skills on this board,” he said.
He also said he plans to resign from the Planning Board, as he doesn’t want to hold two positions at once. He said he expected to be off that board before its July 16 meeting.
“Others need their voice,” he said. “I would be concentrating all my efforts on one position and I think everyone benefits from that.”
