Monthly Archives: October 2009

Information of Bus Routes
Thank you Blacksburg Transit!

The second of 2 Blacksburg Town Council Forums was held on 10/26/09. I think it was a major success. Tough questions were asked and answered. A number of rebuttals occured. You can go to the League of Women Voters of Montgomery County webpage for Candidate Forums and find the Voter Guides in the original version printed prior to the forums, as well as the extended versions of the Voter Guides that include the written responses of questions presented by citizens at the forums (these include those questions that were asked and those that were not asked). Links to the videos, where you can see the forums for yourself, are also included.

I found both the videos and the written responses to be informative individually, yet together I got a much better idea of how the candidates respond to issues that must be dealt with immediately (the forum questions) and how they respond to issues when they are given time to study the issue and do some research. Probably 90% of all the issues elected officials deal with fit into that later category of allowing time for the official to study the issue before expressing an opinion or casting a vote.

There is one question that I would have asked these candidates, if I had been a Blacksburg resident. That question would have been:

Being involved with the forums caused me to start doing a little bit of looking and asking myself questions. What I found was that most of the real ‘meat’ of what the Blacksburg Town Council does occurs during the work sessions. By the time the Town Council meeting comes around, the Town Council members have already done all of the background work and discussion and are simply ready to vote.

It is during those work sessions that the public has an opportunity to see how Town Council members are addressing the issues, how they think, what they perceive to be the important features of the issue. This is where many of the citizen concerns are raised and discussed. In short, this is the information that voters need in order to effectively evaluate the performance of their elected officials.

These work sessions are no easier for the public to attend than the council meetings, in fact, because of the time of day, they are often more difficult for people to attend.

In contrast, Christiansburg Town Council does not use work sessions and much of the thought processing and values of the officials comes through in the discussion at Town Council. (You can see examples of this on the videos of those meetings posted on myvaresources.com.) Granted, Christiansburg has not had the long history of having made those meetings accessible in video format. In fact, they still do not do it. Some aggravating old lady does it for them:) But, in the absence of unpublished work sessions, the Christiansburg Town Council allows decision-making to be more open to the public than the system Blacksburg uses. (You better believe that aggravating old lady would be in there recording work sessions for Christiansburg if they were used and posting them online!)

In my opinion, it would be a service to the citizens of Blacksburg, and a good example of open government, if the Blacksburg Town Council would record and make public those work sessions. Minutes do not always provide the full picture and should not be relied upon to provide more than a summary of what occurred.

I wonder if any of the candidates have considered this question, and if they have, would they support it or be against it. Maybe elected officials will discuss it in a work session:)

First a note:

Now…for the rest of the story:)

Well, ya see, it’s like this. If a town or city wants to be sure to have nonpartisan elections, it must be in their Town Charter. Blacksburg has recently updated its Town Charter to do just that. The Commonwealth of Virginia, State Board of Elections publication: November 3, 2009 Elections Candidacy Requirements for Local Offices has a footnote on page 2, the calendar that addresses this. Look at foot note 1, paragraph 3 and you will see the following:

Guess that pretty much brings all of those arguments about party politics damaging the local elections if moved to November right back home to roost.

A quick glance at the City of Radford and Town of Christiansburg Charters show….(drum roll)…no restriction concerning the elections being nonpartisan.

Given that information, it looks like the elections, whether in May or in November could become partisan on a whim. There is nothing preventing it from happening. The timing of the elections is not the issue. It is the absence of language in the Town Charter restricting this.

Of course, this was just a quick glance and I will be looking for and requesting additional information, but it seems that if current elected officials are concerned about ‘partisan politics’, they simply need to get on the ball and do something about their Charters. They might even want to look at Blacksburg’s recent Charter changes as a model for how to do it.

Thursday, October 15, 2009, 7-9pm. League of Women Voters of Montgomery County, Virginia Interfaith Center, and the NAACP cosponsored Candidate Forum for Delegate. (See candidate information in the Voters Guide at lwvmcva.org. A video of the debate will be hosted on the LWV-of Montgomery County website as soon after the debate as it can be managed. If you know the questions you would like to ask candidates, go ahead and put each question on an individual 3×5 card and be ready to turn it in to the people collecting questions. Or, wait until you get there and obtain a card, fill it out and submit it.

You, as a voter, will be part of making decisions on November 3rd that will affect your life and the lives of your friends and family members for decades to come. Isn’t it worth taking a couple of hours to have an opportunity to evaluate these candidates? Will the results of the election lead to more of the same or to change? What issues are important to you? This is your opportunity to be the boss. Evaluate the credentials of those who hope to work for you and cast your vote according to your goals and objectives for our State.

Need more information?

In both of the local Delegate races, you can find information on the incumbents and their challengers at Richmond Sunlight & Project Vote Smart.

Unfortunately, these are useful sources of information only when you are assessing candidates who are or have been in office.

My personal preference of those two sites is the Richmond Sunlight because they also host videos of votes on bills. (Gotta love those videos!) And, you can download the entire voting record for elected officials over several years. This allows you to get a much better feel for the issues the candidates suupport. Perhaps a vote is like a picture in that “one vote is worth a thousand words”.

A quick review of just those bills from the 2009 session gives a view of where the candidates have focused their energies. Of course, it also gives you an idea of which years the candidates chose to try to push issues that might be unpopular, thus affecting their electability.

If you are taking the time to look, don’t forget to look and see who has contributed to the campaign finances of each of the candidates. It is typical that campaign funds come from those who share the ideals and values of the candidate.

Be an educated voter. Don’t take something as fact just because someone tells you it is true.

You may want to check out information on the candidates for governor at FactCheck.org. On this site, the goal is to find the truth behind allegations of different parties/candidates. Makes for some very interesting reading.