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Hampden, Hampshire voters fill three open legislative seats, re-elect incumbents

State Senator-elect Jacob Oliveira speaks to supporters gathered on Election Night 2022 at the Gremio-Lusitano Club in Ludlow.
Paul Tuthill
/
WAMC
State Senator-elect Jacob Oliveira speaks to supporters gathered on Election Night 2022 at the Gremio-Lusitano Club in Ludlow.

Successors to Eric Lesser, Joe Wagner elected

There has been a declaration of victory and a conceding of defeat in one of the more closely-watched elections for a state legislative seat in western Massachusetts.

More than two hours after the polls closed and with about 30 percent of votes still uncounted, Jake Oliveira appeared before supporters at a club in Ludlow and declared victory for the State Senate in the Hampden, Hampshire, and Worcester District.

“ I am proud to say that I will be the next State Senator from the Hampden, Hampshire, and Worcester District,” he said to applause and cheers.

Oliveira, a first-term Democratic State Representative, won election to the Senate by about 6,400 votes over business-owner Bill Johnson, a Republican, according to still incomplete unofficial returns.

Johnson conceded in a statement released by his campaign just after 12:30 p.m. Wednesday. He said “The voters have spoken and I respect the outcome.”

The Senate district, which was redrawn based on the 2020 U.S. Census, had no incumbent because of Senator Eric Lesser’s decision to run, unsuccessfully as it turned out, for Lieutenant Governor.

Oliveira, 36, a Ludlow native who became active in local government while in high school, said a grassroots campaign was the key to his Senate election victory in the district that includes all or parts of 12 cities and towns.

“We knocked on over 20,000 doors in this campaign, I did alone, our team knocked on even more during the last 10 months,” Oliveira told reporters.

Johnson stressed pocketbook issues in his campaign, contrasting his support for suspending the state’s gasoline tax to Oliveira’s opposition. Johnson was endorsed by Gov. Charlie Baker – one of the few endorsements the popular and now lame duck governor made.

Funding for infrastructure, including east-west rail, roads, and bridges, will be a legislative priority, said Oliveira.

“We have aging infrastructure,” Oliveria said pointing to old mill buildings that need to have “new life breathed into them.” He called for investments in water and sewer infrastructure and projects to get Massachusetts on track to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.

He said he plans to meet with Lesser and his soon-to-be colleagues in the State Senate from districts that border his. Oliveira said it is important for western Massachusetts legislators to “speak with a unified voice” because the delegation is smaller than the number of legislators representing the city of Boston.

Democratic State Rep. Brian Ashe of Longmeadow attended Oliveira’s victory celebration and praised his colleague.

“He just has a grasp of what’s going on and he can articulate it back to the constituents,” Ashe said. “Even though we lost a great senator in Eric Lesser, we’re not going to skip a beat.”

The election to succeed Oliveira in the Massachusetts House was won by Democrat Aaron Saunders of Belchertown, who defeated Republican Chip Harrington of Ludlow.

Another open seat – the 8th Hampden – was claimed by Democrat Shirley Arriaga of Chicopee. She will succeed State Rep. Joe Wagner, who is retiring after a three-decade career on Beacon Hill.

State Senator John Velis, the Westfield Democrat who first won the Hampden and Hampshire District seat in a special election in 2020, was reelected in a landslide over Republican Cecelia Calabrese.

In a lone bright spot for Republicans in western Massachusetts, State Rep. Nick Boldyga has claimed re-election to a seventh term representing the 3rd Hampden District in the Massachusetts House. The AP has not yet called that race between Boldyga and Democrat Anthony Russo.

The record-setting tenure of Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno. The 2011 tornado and its recovery that remade the largest city in Western Massachusetts. The fallout from the deadly COVID outbreak at the Holyoke Soldiers Home. Those are just a few of the thousands and thousands of stories WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill has covered for WAMC in his nearly 17 years with the station.