“We have an opportunity with this, but we have to do something with it,” he said of his strong showing among students.

Several councillors congratulated DeBergalis on his high total of number one votes and said that the student-centered ideas in his campaign should be taken into consideration.

“We have a lot to learn from reaching out to young people, and I think that’s what he did,” councillor Henrietta Davis said.

Councillor Timothy J. Toomey Jr., said he appreciated receiving a copy of DeBergalis’s campaign letter in which he asked for voters’ number one vote—but crossed out “#1” and wrote in “#2” when sending it to Toomey.

“He’s a very energetic and smart young man,” Toomey said. “It looks like he has a future in politics.”

Based on the early results last night, candidates needed 1,950 first place votes to reach quota out of 19,490 ballots cast. Galluccio was the only one to reach quota in the first round, with 2,908 first-place votes.

The candidates had to wait until almost 1 a.m. to hear the unofficial results of the ballot transfers, after the ballot counting machine in the two precincts overloaded and those ballots had to be recounted.

The city will announce the official tallies today after write-in and incorrectly marked ballots are counted by hand and factored into the totals.

Maher, who was elected on the strength of transfer ballots after winning a lower number of first place votes, said he was glad that it appeared the current council would remain in office for another two-year term.

“This council’s worked well together,” he said. “I think that there’s been a lot accomplished.”

Last week the councillors voted unanimously to approve a deal with Harvard which regulated the development of the Riverside neighborhood by allowing Harvard to build taller buildings than community members had originally wanted, in exchange for providing public open space and affordable housing for city residents.

At Reeves’ campaign headquarters before the election, veteran local politician and Riverside activist Saundra Graham said she was pleased with the councillors’ actions and believed the incumbents would all win re-election.

“I thought they worked together well at the end,” she said.

While she said she did not like the last-minute nature of the agreement and wanted more time to look over the details, she said it was “something we can live with.”

Reeves was poised to win by a more comfortable margin than in 2001, when he had only a dozen more first place votes than challenger John R. Pitkin.