LOWER VOTER TURNOUT IN NORTHERN NEW ENGLAND

Brattleboro Reformer Glenn Adams Associated Press 11 November 2008

The nearly 327,000 Vermont voters who cast ballots accounted for 66 percent of the state's eligible voters. Of those, 29 percent -- also a record -- did so via early and absentee ballots, according to Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz. Last Tuesday's turnout percentage of eligible voters falls short of the 1992 figure, she said.

But this year's raw participation figure was higher than in the 2004 presidential election, when 314,220 people cast ballots.

While voter participation by absentee ballots was heavy if not a record in all three northern New England states, it did not translate into record turnouts.

"What was interesting to me was that our (town) clerks were reporting that they thought it was going to be much higher. In part, that was because they had such an overwhelming demand for early ballots. Election Day in Vermont began weeks before Nov. 4. So it wasn't as busy as it could've been," Markowitz said.

Find out how New Hampshire and Maine did here.