Inside your newspaper today you will find two special sections: Living 50-plus: Social Security Edition and the Election Guide.

The former is a special edition of the Living 50-plus special section that comes out quarterly. The latter is a new supplement to our publications designed to help voters get to know the candidates they have the chance to vote for in just a couple of weeks.

While we did not have 100 percent participation from candidates in contested races, we did receive response from a significant percentage of those seeking public office. Our hope is that this publication will help voters in making educated decisions of who to cast their ballots for on Nov. 4.

To shed more light on the process we went through to complete this publication, I thought I would explain what was asked of candidates participating.

Approximately one month ago, Leader Publications staff mailed printed questionnaires to the home addresses of candidates in every contested race.

Candidates were given 50 words to answer each of the questions. If candidates exceeded the word limit, their answers were cut from the end.

In our coverage area (south Berrien County and all of Cass County), there are 105 candidates seeking election. Due to a limited amount of space in this special section, we only mailed questionnaires to the 86 candidates in contested races.

A number of uncontested candidates submitted questionnaires after seeing the call for submissions in our print and digital publications. These questionnaires were not included in the physical election guide, but will be available on the Leader Publications website early next week, along with questionnaires for every candidate who submitted one.

Although not all candidates submitted questionnaires, voters can find lists of everyone competing in the election at the beginning of each subsection.

This is a new project for us, and I hope it is as beneficial to readers as we had hoped when designing the publication. As always, I am open to suggestions for improvement or any kind of feedback regarding our election coverage, this special section or otherwise.

If nothing else, I hope this project served as a reminder for everyone in our communities to get out and vote. I hope that you will take the time to read the profiles for the candidates in your area in order to make informed and educated decisions before heading to the polls.

 

Ambrosia Neldon is the managing editor at Leader Publications. She can be reached by email at ambrosia.neldon@leaderpub.com, or by phone at (269) 687-7713.