AUG 2018 – Chamber to hold City Council Candidate Interviews

 

Redlands Chamber to hold City Council Candidate Interviews

This year the citizens of the City of Redlands will be asked to choose council members from three new districts and select a candidate to represent the city at large.

The perks of district voting, in which a city is divided into sections and residents living in each part elect their own council member, include better representation because the constituent pool is smaller, and campaigns cost less, making it easier for more people to run for office.

On the downside, district voting can lead council members to be more concerned about their own part of town rather than the city as a whole, and it tends to promote bargaining rather than consensus building among council members.

District elections were forced upon the city and are now the reality. This year Districts, 1, 3 and 5 will have an election to select representatives and one seat representing the at large population will also be on the ballot.

To help the voters better understand who the candidates are and what they bring to the seat, the Chamber’s Government Review Committee will invite each candidate to meet with a panel in each of the districts. Following the interviews the Chamber will also host forums in each of the districts inviting the local constituents to join them to learn about each of the candidates asking for their votes.

The chamber will also host a City Council Candidates Academy inviting all candidates to meet with City staff and department heads to learn first-hand what departments do, where responsibility lies, what kind of budgets are allocated to each department, how the process works.

Sir Francis Bacon noted, “Knowledge is Power”, and in the case of selecting elected representation it is essential.