All three candidates for trustee in Shorewood are fighting an uphill battle. The object of this battle is to gain the notice and attention of residents who allot almost no time and energy in their busy lives to pay attention to municipal politics. This battle plays itself out on front lawns in the form of lawn signs, online in the form of blogs, and in mailboxes in the form of leaflets.
For the last several years, this battle has not been strongly waged on one of the battlefields that should be important: the local newspaper.
The miniscule and surface level coverage that Shorewood Village Trustee elections get in the local paper is nothing short of scandalous. Very few articles even appear in the paper, and those that do mostly summarize candidates written answers to a few softball questions, rather than providing new information or insight (
see today's example). There is no investigation into the background of the candidates, no examination of the voting records of incumbents, no in-depth pieces on new candidates who may be unfamiliar to voters. No reporter from the Shorewood Herald, North Shore Herald, or North Shore NOW has attended a forum or debate since 2005.
Without newspapers providing objective, in-depth coverage of the election, voters are left to make up their minds based on their neighbors' endorsements, a well placed lawn sign, or a glossy brochure left in the door the weekend before the election. Our candidates deserve better than this, as do the voting citizens of our Village.
