April 20, 2023 By Carol Britton Meyer
The April 24 Town Meeting scheduled for next Monday, April 24, is expected to draw a large crowd — as many as 2,000 voters.
The doors will open at 5:30 p.m., with a 7 p.m. start time. “The lines start getting long beginning at 6:45 p.m.,” Town Administrator Tom Mayo said during Wednesday night’s Select Board meeting. “We encourage [folks] to come early.”
Plans are in place to accommodate attendees in first the Hingham High School gym and once filled, the auditorium, and if that location fills up, the cafeteria is also available for overflow seating.
For voters with COVID concerns, each of the three seating areas will have a small designated area with “checkerboard seating — every other seat” to allow social distancing, according to Mayo.
Masks will be available at the check-in points, along with hand sanitizer and large-print warrants. “We’ll also be piloting a closed-captioning system this year,” he said.
If Town Meeting business doesn’t wrap up the first night, the “journey through the warrant” [as former Town Moderator Tom O’Donnell used to say] will continue on Tuesday evening — same location and time.
Once the High School parking and on-street parking spaces around that building are filled, overflow parking will be offered at South Shore Baptist Church at the corner of Free and Main Streets, with shuttle transportation available to and from Town Meeting.
Should that lot fill up, additional overflow parking will be available at Wompatuck State Park, with shuttle service also available to the High School both ways from there.
A copy of the Town Meeting warrant, featuring 35 articles, has been mailed to every Hingham household.
Voters are encouraged to read the warrant from cover to cover, especially the Advisory Committee report outlining the background to, and details of, the proposed $7.9 million override and all the information related to the warrant articles and to bring their warrants with them to Town Meeting.