With civic elections less than a month away, some Tri-Cities residents may be complaining about the sheer number of candidates to consider.
But in a democracy, just like the right not to vote, everyone has the right to run for public office, as long as they get the required number of nominators.
Truth is, there aren't too many candidates but too few voters. Less than 25% of eligible voters in the Tri-Cities cast ballots in the 2011 municipal election.
For some, that's not enough, raising concerns about who will be running the cities. Good question.
Is it someone who supports the business community? Someone who is backed by unions or by developers? Someone running on environmental issues?
You should know what each candidate stands for. And it may seem like there are too many of them, each with a campaign platform. That is a lot of reading.
Fortunately, there are plenty of opportunities to get to know the candidates - their websites, social media and public meetings are just a few forums.
There is also this newspaper. The Tri-City News will publish three city-specific VoteSmart voters' guides inside the Nov. 7 edition of the paper. In them - and online, too, of course - voters can read about every candidate for mayor, city councillor and school trustee.
Further, you can already view online videos, produced by The Tri-City News and Tri-Cities Community TV, of candidates - just one minute per council or school trustee candidate, two minutes for mayoral candidates. You can find all that coverage at tricitynews.com/municipalelection (to view the videos, click on Election Candidates).
So there's no excuse not to get acquainted with candidates and be prepared to vote by Nov. 15.
It doesn't seem too lofty a goal to get at least half the voters in the Tri-Cities to turn out for the municipal elections.
