FRAMINGHAM – Election Day is Tuesday, November 4: just two weeks from today! Read on for links to information about candidates, the ballot question, and where and how to vote:
What’s on your ballot this year?
Framingham is voting for Mayor, District City Councilors, School Committee members, and a ballot question on changes to the city charter. There are also uncontested races for library and cemetery trustees. At-large City Councilors are not up for election this cycle.
For contested district races, District 2 is the only part of the city that has competition on the ballot for both City Council and School Committee. Districts 3, 4, and 8 have contested City Council races; and District 6 has two candidates for an open School Committee seat.
There are links to sample ballots for every precinct on this page of the city website. Don’t know your precinct? Enter your address at this page of the Mass. Secretary of State’s website.
How can you find out more about the candidates?
District 2 City Council
Current District 2 City Councilor Brandon Ward is facing a challenge from former Planning Board Chair Carol Spack. Want to know more about them and their positions?
Read their answers to the District 2 Questionnaire:
Watch the Access Framingham D2 City Council debate
If you are a progressive values voter, you may also be interested in their responses to the Progressive Mass questionnaire.
And, you can see both candidates’ Access Framingham video candidate statements:
Brandon: https://youtu.be/adIXDJfKvho
Carol: https://youtu.be/eD2LzXi29VA
Access Framingham also interviewed both District 2 City Council candidates, as did the MetroWest Daily News.
District 2 School Committee
After the September preliminary election, Lorena Tovar (146 votes) and incumbent David Gordon (81 votes) moved on to the Nov. 4 general election.
You can read both School Committee candidates’ answers to the District 2 Questionnaire
Watch the Access Framingham D2 School Committee debate
See their Access Framingham candidate statements:
Lorena Tovar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qsy78MJIvl8
David Gordon: https://youtu.be/LsAfCyYyE-s
If you are a progressive values voter, you may also be interested in their responses to the Progressive Mass questionnaire. Only Lorena Tovar has a published response.
Mayor
Incumbent Mayor Charlie Sisitsky is facing a challenge from Geoffrey Epstein, a former School Committee member in both Framingham and Newton and former chair of the Framingham Finance Committee.
I did not do a mayoral questionnaire this year, but there’s plenty of other information out there for this city-wide race.
You can watch the Access Framingham Mayoral Debate and/or read the MetroWest Daily News article about the debate.
And, you can see both candidates’ video statements on Access Framingham:
Charlie Sisitsky: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cpt1vM2eOOE
Geoff Epstein: https://youtu.be/5_7w_nDNiRc
If you are a progressive values voter, you may also be interested in the candidates’ responses to the Progressive Mass questionnaire. Only Geoff Epstein has a published response.
In addition, the Audrey Hall Show interviewed both mayoral candidates
Mayoral campaign websites
Charlie Sisitsky: https://www.charlieforframingham.com/
Geoff Epstein: https://www.geoffepsteinformayor.com/
Charter Question
Both mayoral candidates, District 2 City Council candidates, and District 2 School Committee candidates support the ballot question.
If you want to find out more about the proposed charter changes, there are links to all the ballot question background material on the city website.
Don’t want to read the 20+ page committee final report, the 60+ page red-lined copy of the charter showing all the changes, plus the document with the City Council’s modifications? Honestly, neither did I 😅
However, I now live in the age of generative AI! 🤖
I asked Google’s NotebookLM to create an AI-generated podcast to explain the ballot question. If you want a basic roundup of all the major changes, this is a pretty easy listen! Charter Review Committee Chair Adam Blumer was kind enough to check it out, and he confirmed that it is largely accurate. There is one small error, which was my fault: Inauguration Day will not change if the ballot question is approved (I hadn’t given the AI the final City Council vote, and the City Council didn’t approve that committee recommendation). You can listen to the podcast free online, but you need to sign in with a Google account. It should be at the bottom right of the NotebookLM page.
You can also ask NotebookLM text questions and it will respond based on the source documents (now including the final City Council charter vote) with links to those sources. I highly recommend that you check the source links it returns, especially if you’re asking about an issue that’s important to you
Other Contested Races
Live in another district besides D2 with a contested election?
MetroWest Daily News published City Council race profiles:
District 3 Council
Mary Kate Feeney and Kenneth Weiss are running for an open seat (Adam Steiner is not running for re-election): Meet the District 3 candidates
District 4 Council
Councilor Michael Cannon is facing challenger Steven Belcher: Meet the District 4 candidates
District 8 Council
Former City Councilor John Stefanini is trying to win back the seat he lost to current incumbent Leslie White Harvey. This is the only re-match from 2023. Meet the District 8 candidates
District 6 School Committee
Eddie Rodriguez and Brent William Lewis are running for an open School Committee seat. Meet the District 6 School Committee candidates
Debates, candidate statements, and newspaper articles
You can watch the City Council and School Committee Access Framingham debates on YouTube and skip around to the parts that interest you.
The MetroWest Daily News covered the City Council debate for all contested races and the Districts 2 and 6 School Committee debates.
You can find links to all the Access Framingham debates, candidate interviews, and candidate statements on their YouTube Election 2025 playlist.
Where and how do you vote?
If you are voting in person, polls are open from 7 am to 8 pm on Tuesday, November 4. You can find your polling place here https://www.sec.state.ma.us/WhereDoIVoteMA/wheredoivote.
If you’ve already received a mail-in ballot, you can drop it in the drop box in front of McAuliffe Library, 746 Water Street. There’s another ballot drop box downtown outside at the rear of the Memorial Building (City Hall, 150 Concord St.). And, you can return mail-in ballots in person at the City Clerk’s office, Room #105 in the Memorial Building when that office is open.
However you return them, vote-by-mail ballots must be received by 8 pm on Nov. 4. Or, you can decide not to use that ballot after all and vote in person on Election Day.
What can’t you do? Bring your mail-in ballot to a regular polling place. Obviously, you can’t use the mail-in ballot and also vote in person.
Want to vote by mail but didn’t request a mail-in ballot yet? It feels kind of late to me to be asking for a vote-by-mail ballot now, but technically you have up until five business days before the election – which I calculate to be Oct. 28 – for your application to reach the City Clerk’s office.
How do you register or check if you’re registered to vote?
Not sure if you’re registered? Check here at the Mass. Secretary of State’s office site.
Need to register? You have until Oct. 25 at 5 pm to register in person at the City Clerk’s office in the Memorial Building and Oct. 25 at 11:59 pm to register online https://www.sec.state.ma.us/OVR/.
Sign up for the District 2 email-list.