"We knew that there was a multiplier effect, but we didn't know exactly what it was," he said in an interview at Democratic headquarters regarding the sessions, which featured cookies baked by his wife, Marge, that were held in homes across town as many as four times a week since this summer.
In a mild surprise, Mr. Davidson, a former selectman and former chairman of the Board of Finance, captured 1,771 votes to 1,483 for Republican nominee Bill Tinsley, a six-year member of the finance board, and 1,166 for petitioning candidate Ernie Nepomuceno, who changed his registration from Republican to unaffiliated this summer and ran as a petitioning candidate in Tuesday's balloting.
Incumbent Robert Silvaggi, who won by 10 votes in 2007 as a petitioning candidate, announced in July that he would not seek a second term.
Mr. Davidson stood outside the 75-foot zone in District II at Brookfield High School for most of the Election Day greeting voters as they went to the polls.
Mr. Tinsley and former Republican First Selectman Jerry Murphy pledged to support Mr. Davidson's platform but said that the GOP would have won the first selectman's race if Mr. Nepomuceno had not entered the race in August and divided the votes among Brookfield's fiscal conservatives.
"We connected with a lot of people at the neighborhood meetings," Mr. Davidson said of the sessions where he and other Democratic candidates presented information, including charts, on municipal issues. "Some of the people we converted that night and some of those people never were going to be converted."
Town Clerk Joan Locke said the 46 percent turnout was slightly lower than participation in 2003, the last time the town had a three-way race for the top elected position, which pays about $73,000 annually.
Mr. Tinsley, the owner of Play It Again Sports near the intersection of Candlewood Lake and Federal roads, devoted extensive time to going door-to-door and Mr. Nepomuceno held some meet-and greet sessions and also visited voters door-to-door.
Mr. Davidson said he did a "modest" amount of door-to-door campaigning, preferring instead to have families in town invite friends to their home for an hour or more of discussion with members of the Democratic ticket on their proposals to, among other things, hire a town planner, repair the town's crumbling roads, make improvements to the facilities at Cadigan Park and acquire alternate sources of revenue such as placing cellular phone communications systems on municipal property.
Departing Selectman Joni Park, who is the Democratic Town Committee chairman, said there has been mounting support for better town services in the recent years. She noted that many residents signed an electronic petition in the winter of 2008 to seek a higher spending increase for the municipal budget and sports groups have cited the need to upgrade Cadigan Park on Candlewood Lake Road, which reportedly is in need of infrastructure improvements.
Mr. Davidson and Mr. Tinsley both emphasized the need for improving the roads and the recreation facilities during a campaign in which signs dotted lawns throughout Brookfield.
Political observers believe that there will be ample opportunity for agreement between Mr. Davidson and the incoming other selectmen-Republican Steve O'Reilly, who is concluding an eight-year career on the finance board, and Democrat Howard Lasser, who has spent nine years on the finance board over two stints, and other municipal officials.
Former Democratic Selectman Richard Amorossi said that this would be the first time in Brookfield's 221-year history that it will have two Democrats on the Board of Selectmen.
"We're on the same page on roads and recreation," Mr. Tinsley said at Republican headquarters at 774 Federal Road, just a tenth of a mile from the Democratic headquarters, which was located in a former real estate office at 801 Federal Road.
In an interview in September, Mr. Davidson said the town's debt service would decline over the coming years as the town makes payments on the recent $31.875 million renovation of Brookfield High School.
He said that over a series of years, Brookfield should spend a combined $10 million to $15 million on road repairs.
In 2004, Mr. Murphy com­missioned a study on the roads and subsequently recommended that $800,000 to $1 million should be spent annually on repairs. The town, due to budget constraints, has never come close to meeting that figure in the last five years.
Mr. Davidson said that, with the declining debt, the town could afford to bond for road repairs and also take bonds to make improvements to Cadigan Park and, if necessary, the 20-year-old Kids Kingdom play ground behind the town hall on Pocono Road and the proposed bike path in the northern part of Brookfield.
"If you can show people the value of what their tax money is going to pay for you can get support for projects," Mr. Lasser said.
"We had a $24 million proposed renovation to the high school defeated in 2002 and then a year later the voters approved a $31 million renovation because it was explained better and there was more input from more people in town," said Ron Jaffe, who has served on the Board of Education for seven years and was elected now to a seat on the finance board. He apparently also won the votes of parents concerned about lower spending in recent years on the town's school programs.
Mr. Davidson has said that a relatively small number of parents of school-age children have voted in the recent municipal elections and that he has spent considerable resources to capture support from that group.
Mr. Amorossi, who was the party's nominee for first selectman in 2003, said Mr. Davidson also had significant support from the town's senior citizens. "You can't win an election in Brookfield without the senior citizen vote," Mr. Amorossi said.
Mr. Davidson has been applauded for his performance as chairman of the finance board from late 1995 to late 2001, when the town approved the proposed municipal budget four times in the first referendum.
Mr. Murphy said that the incoming first selectman did "a splendid" job of chairing ad-hoc committees on municipal issues during his term as one of the other selectmen from late 2003 to late 2005.
Mr. Davidson has been credited with organizing Republicans United For Brookfield, the organization that helped elect Mr. Murphy as first selectman in 2003. He helped assemble a long list of potential contacts among the members of their ticket that were sent personal notes and e-mail messages.
"We got a lot of positive feedback to our post cards," Mrs. Park said regarding some of the communications that the Democrats utilized during the recent campaign.
Mr. Davidson has pledged to hold two meetings a month in which residents can discuss municipal issues with him and to have lunch at the senior center on the last Friday of every month.
Republicans appeared optimistic about regaining the first selectman's office, which they had held for 20 consecutive years before Mr. Silvaggi's surprise victory in 2007. However, the headquarters became silent at 8:19 p.m. as the preliminary results was posted on a screen and indicated that Mr. Davidson had won the election.
At Democratic headquarters, Mr. Davidson was being con­gratulated by a raft of supporters. In his 4-minute acceptance speech he, in particular, praised Mrs. Park, Mr. Lasser and Mr. Jaffe for their input on strategy. He noted that a planning group for the campaign had been meeting weekly on Friday mornings.
Throughout the campaign, Mr. Davidson said the race would be more about the issues in town and the candidate's qualification than party affiliation.
"Bill is well known in town and known for working with a broad group of people," said former Democratic Town Committee Chairman Robert Marconi, who serves as a state assistant attorney general. "He had the support of a lot of Republicans and unaffiliated voters," he added.
Mr. Davidson initially sought the Republican nomination when he entered the race in March but decided a month later to seek the Democratic nomination to better assure him of being in the race in November.
"Bill Davidson is a smart man with a lot of energy who deserves the chance to lead," Mr. Tinsley said. The Republican candidate said he would not have changed anything and that despite the results he was pleased that he made "a lot of new friends" during the campaign.
Mr. Nepomuceno said at his headquarters at 270 Federal Road that he didn't' think that enough people "who are concerned about their taxes" went to the polls.
"The conservatives will always vote for me," he said when asked whether his campaign cost Mr. Tinsley the election because it divided the conservative vote.
Mr. Nepomuceno said that, with a projected level grand list for the next fiscal year, it will be hard for the town to make improvements without increasing taxes.
He said that he made many new friends over the last three months and that with his term about to end on the finance board he probably would spend time away from municipal government over the coming months.
Mr. Davidson said that he planned to appoint a transition team prior to his taking office Dec. 7.
Although the Republicans failed to regain control of the first selectman's office, they did fare well in many of the other races on the municipal ticket for the new term. Former Board of Education Chairman Jerry Friedrich, with 2,066 votes, and Board of Assessment Appeals member Irv Agard, with 2,056 votes, will serve on the finance board.
Mr. Jaffe, with 1,799 votes, and fellow Democratic candidate Jennifer Tomaino, with 1,750 votes, also captured terms on the finance board. The other contenders were Republicans Michael Moen, with 2,019 votes, and Greg Dembowski, with 1,862 votes, and Democrats Caroline Hermans, with 1,583 votes, and incumbent Elio Petta, with 1,454 votes.
Republican Jane Miller, with 2,889 votes, and Democrats Ray DiStephan, with 2,309 votes, and incumbent Bruce MacDonald, with 2,449 votes, were elected to four-year terms on the Board of education. Six-year Republican incumbent Rob Gianazza, with 2,190 votes, took a two-year term on the board over Democrat Victor Katz, who had 1,810 votes.
Republican Angela Finelli, with 2,155 votes, and Democratic incumbent Louise Trojanowski-Marconi, with 1,718 votes, each won terms on the Board of Assessment Appeals.
Republicans Patrick Conlon, with 2,470 votes, Art Kerly, with 2,217 votes, and Ronnie Baiad, with 2,225 votes, won terms on the Planning Commission. The other candidates were Democrats David Matte, with 1,752 votes, and Alice Dew, 1,869 votes.
Republicans Ryan Blessey, with 1,899 votes, William Mercer, with 1,785 votes, and Christopher Lynch, with 1,863 votes, took seats on the Zoning Commission.
The other candidates for that office were petitioning incumbents Ray Murphy, with 1,299 votes, and Richard Horree, 1,015 votes, and Democrats Cheryl Duva, 1,306 votes, Mr. Amorossi, 1,476 votes and Francis Lollie, 1,346 votes.
The GOP also swept the races for the Zoning Board of Appeals, as Curtis Timmerman, with 2,600 votes, George Mayette, with 2,474 votes, and Patrick Donohue, with 2,663 votes, getting elected. Democrat Linda Wagner amassed 2,026 votes in that contest.