Letters to the Editor - Bastian: ‘This election is about principles’
As usual, on this last Wednesday morning I perused the online edition of the Brandon Valley Journal –partially to see how much my favorite editor had “improved” my column submitted earlier, but also to keep in touch with the community and what is going on.
Among the local seasonal traditions of graduations, scholarship awards, retirements, and other news – you in South Dakota you are bearing down on the June 2 Primary election.
My favorite editor did a fabulous job of covering so many of the events, announcements, retirements, and decisions in local government – and – giving you the insight of very important decisions that will be made in the Primary election happening next week. Who will be running in November? What do they stand for? How do they see local issues that affect today, tomorrow, and years to come? Answering standard questions that they know will be published for all voters review, standing up for community get togethers, showing their faces, going on the record face to face with the voters.
If you took advantage of those public forums to size up these people in person – good for you! But you have the next best thing in Brandon.
All in one very local publication – and I hope you are reading this in that local publication today!
By contrast I have been working very hard to fill out our ballots in the Texas Primary to be held on the day before this publication (May 26). The mailbox is flooded with mailers that are difficult to really believe. Even the local ones, much less the statewide very publicized contests, with the noise from them drowning out local information.
Your statewide primaries are probably the same as ours in Texas – you don’t have a lot of information you can truly trust. The “Parties or PACs” rule on what information is released, when, and how and unfortunately how loud.
But locally, I have had to use the internet to identify who is running, who they are, much less try to figure out what they stand for or why they are running for the offices I think are important in the local government (at least to me, trying to understand how Texas government works). No standard questions, certainly no one published source, and so it becomes a guessing game.
That is why I am green with envy. Brandon residents, do your research, it is right here in your hands, please do your civic duty and get out to vote – with the information to make decisions that can shape your local future!
