Woolwich re-elected both their chairman of the board of selectman and road commissioner. They also passed a referendum ending Pay As You Throw (PAYT) at Tuesday’s general election.

Election Marshall David Kloberdans announced the election results at 8:10 p.m., 10 minutes after the polls closed at Woolwich Central School.

In the selectman’s race, David King Sr. will return for another three-year term to the five-member board, winning over challenger Don Adams of Shaw Road. Both men were at the polls when the results were read and shook hands afterwards, King telling Adams that he’d run a good race. The final tally was King 551, Adams 491. There were seven write-ins for the position.

King was pleased by the outcome and told the Wiscasset Newspaper he expected it would be a close race. “I’m glad to be re-elected and I’m more than willing to serve the town as long as they’ll have me.” King, 66, has served as a Woolwich selectman for 20 years, the last 10 as the board’s chairman.

Adams, 57, was making his first bid at elected office and campaigned door-to-door in the days leading up to the election. He said afterward he plans to stay actively involved in town politics.

For Adams it was a bittersweet night. He lost his bid for selectman but saw his petition effort to repeal PAYT overwhelmingly passed by voters. “I’m really happy so many people turned out for the election,” he said afterwards. “If it wasn’t for them we’d still be buying those orange WasteZero bags.”

King and Adams were on opposite sides of the PAYT/WasteZero question. Adams led the petition effort for repeal of town membership in the program insisting the vote be carried out during the general election. King opposed the referendum, preferring to revisit PAYT at the 2016 town meeting.

Voters overwhelmingly approved the referendum to sever the town’s contract with Andover, Massachusetts-based WasteZero, ending the two-month-old program that requires residents to purchase plastic bags for disposal of their non-recyclable trash. The finally tally was 616 to 453 in favor of the referendum. Under the terms of the contract selectmen must give WasteZero two months’ notice for ending membership in the PAYT program.

By a wide margin voters returned Jack Shaw for another three-year term as road commissioner. Shaw, 69, of Walker Road has held the post for 32 years. He was challenged by Joseph Creamer, 55, of Dana Mills Road. Creamer, who operates a general contractor and excavation business, ran against Shaw three years ago and lost. The final tally was 739 votes for Shaw, 373 for Creamer.

Creamer said he had hoped to have done a little better but thanked his supporters. Shaw was not present when the results were read.

On the state referendum questions Woolwich voters rejected Question 1, 564-538; passed Question 2, 721-385 and passed Question 3, 785-315.

In a non-binding straw vote, residents were asked to offer their preference on what day of the week to hold the town meeting: 185 picked Saturday, 101 for a week night, and 51 had no preference. The results were tabulated by Selectman Allison Hepler.

Janice Bradford, town clerk, said 20 new voters registered at the polls and 85 residents voted by absentee ballot. More than 1,100 voters turned out for the election, about half of the town’s registered voters.