Another election season underway

By Chuck Kajer

Last week I wrote about football season being in full swing. I hope all the high school football fans who read my column enjoyed the quiz.

This week, I’m going to write about a different season that is just getting underway. That is election season.

This being an odd-numbered year, the election season is much shorter than it was last year, when we had a presidential election, and next year, when Minnesotans will elect a Governor, U.S. Senator and congressmen. But it is still an important election for residents of the New Prague Area School District, as well as those in the cities of New Market and Lonsdale.

With election season comes the inevitable letters to the editor. These letters seem to have increased in number over the years, as candidates and their supporters mount letter-writing campaigns expounding the value of their candidates and, occasionally, pointing out the deficiency of others. Fortunately, we don’t get as many of the second type of letters in a local campaign. It’s once you get into the county and legislative races where you see more of those.

The Times will accept letters to the editor regarding the November 8 election and publish them through the month of October. The final issue for letters regarding the election will be October 27.

We ask that all letters be submitted typed and double-spaced. Letters can be sent by fax (952-758-4135), by mail (PO Box 25, New Prague, MN, 56071) or by email (news@newpraguetimes.com). Letters should be no more than 300 words in length

When sending letters, please include your name, address and a daytime phone number for verification purposes. We will not publish a letter without the name of the writer. We do not publish letters that list multiple authors (more than 3). Also, we will not publish letters that are libelous.

One other thing we will not do is publish a letter from a candidate, unless the candidate is responding directly to a charge that appeared in the letters column. A candidate has a responsibility to make their positions known, and we offer two forums for them to get the word out. The first is with a candidate questionnaire, which they will be receiving this week. The Times will publish the candidates’ responses to these questionnaires in the October 27 issue. The other forum for candidates to make their positions known is through a paid advertisement. Our advertising staff is able to help candidates get their message out to the public.

Letters must be received by 5 p.m. on Monday in order to be considered for that week’s edition. Depending on the volume of letters received, we may not be able to publish all letters we receive. We will do our best to balance the letters among the different candidates, and we reserve the right to edit letters for length.

Good luck to all the candidates in the coming election.