WESTPORT — By clear show-of-hands majority, voters at Tuesday’s special town meeting in Westport approved changes to the town’s Right to Farm bylaw that put an end to the town Board of Health’s new animal registry and that loosen definitions of what constitutes a farm in Westport.

The hotly debated measure drew a throng that packed the Westport High School Auditorium — attendance was announced at 650 by Moderator Steve Fors.

After presentations by a backer of petition article #3 and and a member of the Board of Health speaking in opposition, audience members lined up at the microphones for better than an hour of debate. Speakers from both sides received applause, but those speaking in favor of the article drew the louder cheers.

Finally, a woman called the question, a motion that received strong audience support, and the article was put to a vote at around 8:40 p.m.

Non-medical marijuana

Later in the evening, voters also supported articles that enable the sale and cultivation of 'non-medical ' marijuana (for recreational use) in Westport.

The vote reverses one taken last year when voters agreed to allow the sale and cultivation of marijuana for medical use but rejected doing business with recreational marijuana.

The petition drive was led by Westport resident Diego Bernal, a director of Coastal Healing Inc., a company that is in the process of obtaining permits to open the town’s first medical marijuana sales and cultivation facility at 248 State Road.