If you have any interest at all in improving this part of the state we call home, you should already have plans to be in attendance at Slater Auditorium on the Norwich Free Academy Campus tonight starting at six for debates between and among the candidates seeking our votes next month for the 19th District of the State Senate and, following at seven, those for the 46th, 47th, and 139th representative districts.
I’m so old I can remember a not-too-distant time when each of our two daily newspapers would sponsor and organize these forums and often attendance, minus the candidates and their families might almost reach triple digits.
These days I’ll be delighted if a report from tonight appears in even one of them.
As for attendance, considering the abysmal turnout for the Norwich City Council informational meeting on EnVision360 (I counted five adults and two children; I’m guessing the Red Sox, Patriots, Bruins, and Celtics were all playing that night. Probably.), I tell myself the advantage of being a pessimist is I can only be surprised and never disappointed.
But, if for no other reason than on behalf of all the folks who are working to make the debate happen, the friends and neighbors who are offering their time and talents in seeking office for our common good, and most importantly for all the opportunities and challenges facing us for the next two years and beyond, it would very fitting if we filled Slater and came prepared to listen to and consider the positions of all those running for office.
When you look at a map of the area for our Senator and State Representatives, you can’t help but be impressed by the diversity and differences of the towns and villages across the districts and the disparate issues and concerns that any office-seeker needs to familiarize themselves with to be an effective advocate on our behalf in Hartford.
Did you know there are 36 Senators, each representing a shade over 99,000 residents, and each of the 151 State Representatives answers to 22,600 inhabitants? That’s a lot of vox populi, especially if we all talk at once and since we rarely, if ever, agree on what one another is saying.
The debate should be an opportunity for us to add to our knowledge of the issues and how those seeking our votes feel about them. I’d suspect we’ll hear about the cost of goods and services (from the gas pump to the grocery store) as well as topics like the police accountability law, proposals for affordable housing, gun safety, as well access to health care, and broadening public education initiatives.
All significant issues, hopefully for all of us, and you can add your own questions for consideration by the moderators by sending them to info.lwvsect@gmail.com. Would you be surprised to learn I already have?
Here’s what I’d ask EVERY candidate to start the evening: “In light of headlines across the country for the last two years alleging unproven voting irregularities, conspiracies, and rigged elections, do you promise all of us here tonight, and one another, that, no matter the outcome of the November 8th vote, you will accept and respect the results of the election as the voters’ decision?”
Not a 'gotcha' question but anyone answering ‘no’ should be asked to leave the stage.
-bill kenny
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