Grounds game: Candidates tap coffees, social media to woo voters
Candidate coffees might be a Acton staple, but competitors in this year’s races are trying to branch out.
Dean Banfield opened his Select Board run with a flurry of voter meetups in supporters’ homes. His opponent, Sam Hiersteiner, flooded social media with campaign updates.
After divergent early approaches, both candidates in this year’s lone contested town race are trying to branch out.
So-called “candidate coffees” are a “high-value proposition,” former School Committee member Cynthia Rainey told The Acton Bridge at a recent Banfield meet-and-greet.
Despite holding several in-person events, Banfield faced questions about his social media strategy that night. Some backers worry a traditional approach won’t be enough to win the day.
“You’re missing the boat if you’re not on Instagram,” Concordian Carroll Sandel said.
Hiersteiner said he’s running “a modern campaign” and was “energized” by early online engagement.
He’s trying to take his candidacy offline, but at the first in a string of weekly appearances at Caffè Nero this past Saturday, Hiersteiner acknowledged that “we didn’t get as big a turnout as I might have thought.”
Up close and personal
Acton has a long tradition of supporters hosting candidates in their homes.
CC King and her husband, Tom Tarpey, hosted Banfield’s February 19 event.
King said these gatherings can encourage more people to cast a ballot. “If you show up in a room with people, you’re more likely to show up to vote,” she said.
Banfield, who is increasing his voter outreach compared with his 2021 Select Board campaign, said face-to-face interaction can reveal what residents of specific neighborhoods really care about.
Regarding social media, he told voters, “We may need to be stepping up our game.” Banfield posted only twice on his campaign Facebook page between the Town Caucus and the beginning of March. He sent an inaugural email blast to voters on February 26.
“He’s got great ideas,” Carroll Sandel said. “I will vote for him.”
She hopes he can get his vision in front of enough other voters to win.
Candidate coffees might be a Acton staple. They also might have missed swaths of voters over the years, and Hiersteiner said, “I don’t frankly think that all candidates for office in this town make an effort to be visible to people who are in my generation.”
Online and offline
Hiersteiner posted well over a dozen times on Facebook and Instagram in February and had several one-on-one meetings with potential supporters.
He says he’s now “moving into the ground game phase” of his Select Board run. “I want to reach as many people as I can, and not everybody here uses social media,” he’s said previously.
Hiersteiner said he was inspired by School Committee member Michael Williams’ multimodal 2025 campaign. Hiersteiner expects to run his own digital ads. He’s also recruiting people to knock on doors and asking for volunteers to host small neighborhood events.
Although his first “coffee chat” didn’t draw droves of visitors, “I’ll keep promoting these events and look forward to speaking with anyone who is interested,” he said.
Campaign proposals
At King and Tarpey’s house, Banfield backed low-power “small-cell” transmitters to help fix Acton’s cellular coverage gaps. As the town eyes major building projects, he’s calling for a standing “Capital Planning Committee” that would annually review municipal needs and upcoming efforts.
Hiersteiner said he was still developing a point of view on some issues as he met with voters last month. He repeated his call for “new perspectives” during a Bridge interview and said he thinks he could use his skill set to better communicate Select Board goals and actions.
Election day is March 31. Mail-in ballots were set to arrive as soon as this week, according to Town Clerk Kaari Mai Tari.
