Fort Worth voters face another slew of elections. Our Editorial Board is here to help
Somehow, another election season is upon us.
The ballot is fairly light — state constitutional amendments, bond-spending proposals from a few local governments and a handful of municipal issues and offices.
But if it seems like we just did this, you’re not wrong. Local elections wrapped up with runoffs that were barely four months ago. And it hardly feels like almost a year since the presidential and congressional elections.
For better or worse, we do a lot of voting in Texas. And that’s one reason that our Editorial Board makes recommendations in key races. As part of our recent focus on making our journalism more transparent, I’d like to explain more fully how we come to decisions on those recommendations.
One common question is, why do it at all? With so many elections, responsible citizenship can feel like a full-time job. Not a lot of readers have the time or resources to do thorough research on the issues and candidates. Our training and experience helps us cut to the chase.
Plus, we have access to candidates and government decision makers, and that’s a benefit for our subscribers. We ask questions and consider the options on your behalf.
We focus on Fort Worth and Tarrant County, but we also weigh in on important statewide contests. Many other local governments serve millions of people in Tarrant County alone. But we can’t get to them all, and we don’t want to make ill-informed recommendations.
By rule, we won’t endorse a candidate we haven’t interviewed. Our goal is to ask about issues that voters will factor into their decisions, and we want to base our recommendations in facts and ideas, not general impressions.
When we meet with candidates, we prefer that those running for an office appear together to provide a contrast. We generally look for experience that suggests a candidate is ready to be effective in public office, whether in business, the military or other government positions.
On issues, we naturally lean toward candidates who share our established positions on major issues. But it’s not an iron-clad rule; also important is evidence of leadership potential and sound decision-making ability for all of the concerns and crises that will pop up in an officeholder’s term.
We also look for candidates who share the values we bring to our editorial positions — transparency, accountability and fiscal prudence in government; general support for business, growth and smart development; and a commitment to justice and fairness.
For incumbents, a review of job performance is part of the process, too. Incumbency can be a potent edge for an officeholder, both through experience and climbing the seniority ladder in Congress or the Legislature. So, we consider: Have they kept their promises? Do they serve their constituents well on individual needs? In short, do they deserve to be fired?
As with all of our Editorial Board deliberations, our endorsement decisions are separate from the work the newsroom does to cover candidates and issues. Reporters who write the news stories about campaigns do not have any input on our choices, and their coverage is not influenced by the stands we take.
Reporters will often sit in on Editorial Board interviews with candidates or public officials and write news stories about what they say or include their comments in larger articles on issues. But when the Editorial Board debates and determines our position, news reporters are not involved.
Agree or disagree with our recommendations, we hope you find our perspective useful in making your decisions. Our goal is not to tell you how to vote or how to think. It’s to do the research and interviews that readers don’t have the time and resources to do themselves.
If we help you make an informed choice, whatever that is, we’ve done our job.
