The Lansing Star has had a policy of not endorsing candidates  While no publication is perfect, we try hard to keep our politics in our private lives and out of the news pages.  To a large extent we even keep our private politics out of the Opinions page.  In our private lives my wife and I are life-long independents (meaning not affiliated with any party, not members of the Independent Party).  We refuse yard signs and don't wear campaign buttons around town, even though I am here to tell you we are a very opinionated couple!

Fairly covering elections is a mine field.  We do like to cover sitting elected officials' doings, but rarely run stories about candidates' statements on what incumbents are doing.  The reason is that sitting officials are doing things in our names, and we should know about them even if they are running for another term.  But challengers' comments are not actions.  We would be criticized if we put them on the News page, and chastised if we put them on the Opinions page.  I choose not to run them, for which I am also criticized.  Sometimes I will report on the news of a campaign, like how much money they have raised in a particular quarter.  And I am criticized for that, usually by the opponent's supportersSo what do I think is fair?

If there is one thing I think we have gotten right in our election coverage, it is candidate interviews.  I usually only interview candidates in contested races, because those are the elections we will have a choice in.  When we do have a choice isn't it better to make it based on how each candidate addresses the issues?  Statistics show that a lot of people just vote along their party line.  That is a terrible way to elect a legislator, because both parties have excellent people and terrible people.

So I try to figure out what other people in town would ask the candidates if they had a chance, then whittle the questions down to a manageable number.  Each candidate running for the same office is asked the same questions.  Sometimes their answers lead to different follow-up questions.  Sometimes they are needed to nail candidates down when they try to deflect a question.

If you bother to pay attention to each candidate's responses, particularly in local elections, it becomes obvious who is serious about running.  Some candidates are completely engaged.  They go to board meetings for months and sometimes years before the election.  They keep informed on issues.  Often they volunteer to serve on committees and speak up at board meetings.

Others have no idea what they are getting into.  Maybe they were asked, drafted or begged to run, because it's not easy to get people to do so.  If elected their first board meeting will be the first one they have attended.  It will take them longer to become effective once seated, if they ever become effective.  I once stopped an interview to explain to a candidate, who was running because he said he would do it if his party couldn't find anyone else to run, that what he was proposing was illegal and impossible according to state and local laws.  He had no idea -- he was talking off the top of his head without having done a thing to learn whether his idea was viable.  If I had published that portion of the interview he would have come across as an ignoramus.  No, thankfully he was not elected.

I like this format.  In a way it's the closest thing Lansing has to a candidate debate, because each candidate responds to the same set of questions in his or her own way.  I publish transcripts of the interviews, not paraphrases.  So readers get a sense of who each candidate is and what they stand for.

As of this writing I have interviewed one candidate, and will interview another six over the next week.  My plan is to interview the two candidates for Lansing Town Supervisor, as well as the four candidates vying for the two open Town Board seats.  I will also interview the candidate for Highway Superintendent, because he is the only one of the three uncontested candidates who is not an incumbent (the other two are the sitting Town Clerk and one of two sitting Justices).

No matter what I think of their politics or preparation it is a privilege to interview political candidates.  In my book anyone who agrees to run is a hero.  It is one thing to read about the people whose names appear on the ballot, but to be able to look them in the eye and ask them what they stand for is a unique opportunity to get to know them a little bit, and to find out what they stand for.  And what they will do if elected.  Publishing the transcripts is my way of sharing that experience with you.  It's not quite the same, but it's as close as I can get.

According to our Web statistics these interviews attract a lot of readers, but I wonder sometimes how much impact they are having when I see the election results.  Whoops -- I guess that's where my own politics come in!  But I will leave you to guess what I really think.  And to decide for yourself what you really think.

This year's interviews will begin appearing over the next three issues of the Lansing Star.  They will remain live through Election Day and beyond.  You can access all past and present articles and interviews from the 2015 election by clicking on the Elections 2015 Articles link in the center column of most pages in the Star.  Or type "elections2015" (without the quotes) in the Star search bar.  As new articles or interviews become available they will also show up in this search.

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