In the weeks and months before the Feb. 26 election, City Bureau, the South Side-based journalism lab, deployed a three-person team of reporters to interview more than 30 Austin residents about the issues that matter most to them.
The journalists then posed those residents’ issues to at least six front-running mayoral candidates, and as many aldermanic candidates in the 28th, 29th and 37th Wards, who would take them on.
The result is this special election issue that Austin Weekly News is proud to publish, in partnership with City Bureau. This issue is designed to be a free, substantive guide to the upcoming aldermanic and mayoral elections for our thousands of West Side readers.
Inside, the reader will find an article in one of six issue categories that is based on resident interviews. Those categories include: schools, crime/policing, black-owned businesses, youth programming, aldermanic accessibility/trust and income/jobs. Below each story, you’ll find proposals, promises and/or statements regarding each category from aldermanic and mayoral candidates
The reader will also find a guide featuring basic voter fundamentals, such as information on early voting, voting by mail and voter registration.
We hope this is a roadmap that will ultimately leave residents more informed and that much more committed not only to vote, but to take up the responsibilities of a public function that’s even more important than voting — that of being an engaged and empowered citizen.
For more in this series:
Everything you need to know to vote Feb. 26
When schools close, there goes the neighborhood
Local officials must dedicate more resources to young people of Austin, residents say
Austin entrepreneurs say candidates must focus on access to capital
Austin residents say key to public safety is rebuilding relationships between community and police
Austin residents still searching for jobs, financial security
Aldermen need to be more accessible, help connect residents to resources
