Councilors Question Race On Night Before Elections

Handshaking, well-wishing and veiled accusations of foul play on the campaign trail dominated the council chambers at Cambridge City Hall last night, as the nine councilors met on the eve of the election that will decided the fate of their political careers for the next two years.

Mayor Alfred E. Vellucci set the tone for the meeting, when he used the customary minute of silence after the opening Pledge of Allegiance to "give the councilors all a minute to pray on the night before election."

"I need an extra minute," said Councilor Daniel J. Clinton. Clinton, a member of the council's conservative Independent bloc, is running for his sixth two-year term.

But as the council members sat down to address an unusually short and mundane agenda, tempers ran short. "They always get a little edgy on the night before the election." Council Secretary Susan Cruickshank said before the meeting.

Independent Councilor Thomas W. Danchy charged that the city has been negligent in its handling of the absentee ballot process.

"Absentee voting has always been somewhat suspicious, but this year it stunk," Danehy said, adding that one of his constituents had accidentally filed two ballots. When the election commission discovered the error, he added, the second ballot was "simply thrown out."

"I don't know if they're intercepting ballots or what," said Danehy, who refused to name the voter.

City Solicitor Russell B. Highley said his investigators would look into the matter this morning.

Vellucci, too, questioned Highley. The mayor said that a bundle of Cambridge Express newspapers containing campaign advertisements, delivered free each week, was stolen from City Hall.

Vellucci declined to comment on which of the candidates had advertised in the Express, but added. "It's is hard to raise money to pay for that advertising, and then to have it disappear from under your nose is what we call a low blow in politics, and it has to be illegal."

Higley agreed to look into Vellucci's allegations.

Danehy then added his complaint against "an organization," also unnamed, whose campaign signs, with "certain names on the bottom," which he did not identify, were being pasted on signposts and street lamps throughout the city.

Clinton said he saw "funny business" in the fact that The Harvard Crimson did not publish a campaign advertisement of his.

"It's no conspiracy, we just forgot to put the ad in." Crimson Advertising Manager Jonathan M. Weintraub '85, said last night. "We're not rich enough to leave out paid ads on purpose," he explained.