What kind of city do you want Columbus to be?
What can our city’s elected leaders do to make your city more livable?
How can they address concerns that are most important to you?
Residents will have opportunities to ask local candidates for their views on those questions and more at upcoming town hall-style events that invite the public to have their say on issues important to them.
With early voting set to begin next week, the nonpartisan grassroots organization Hoosier Action’s Bartholomew County chapter plans to host an event called “Put People First: Columbus Town Hall” from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Monday at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 2651 California St. Organizers recommend attendees register at hoosieraction.org/columbus/.
The local chapter of Hoosier Action says the event will focus on housing, addiction and government transparency — three key issues members identified through “more than 250 conversations with Columbus citizens held by last spring, and described in the People’s Platform created by the Bartholomew County chapter.”
Candidates for Columbus mayor and city council have been invited and many have confirmed they will attend. That’s good for our local representative government, and it’s healthy for members of our community to have opportunities to let candidates know their concerns and what their expectations are for local officials entrusted to lead.
Call this retail politics if you like, but we prefer the term citizenship. The people of our community should have every right and expectation to hear from the candidates and then make an informed decision about why a person has — or hasn’t — earned their vote.
Speaking of citizenship, we also applaud the local chapter of Hoosier Action for leading a grassroots citizen movement that has defined issues that are most important to a wide range of people.
Stephanie Zhang, Bartholomew County community organizer with Hoosier Action, told The Republic’s Jana Wiersema, “There aren’t a whole lot of opportunities, at least from what I have seen and from what we as community members have seen, for just normal folks to talk to and make our most prevalent concerns in the community heard to the folks running for office.”
That may be, but local groups such as Hoosier Action are making it happen. So, too, is the Historic Downtown Neighborhood Alliance, whose members will host a meeting with candidates for City Council District 1, Christopher Bartels and Nick Slabaugh, at 6 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 17, at First Presbyterian Church, 512 Seventh St., Columbus.
Municipal elections for mayor and city council suffer from notoriously low voter turnout. Ironically, these elected officials make more decisions that touch your daily life here in Columbus than those we vote to send to Indianapolis or Washington.
That is a strong argument for local people to get involved, share your views, and let your leaders know what matters to you. Their job is to represent you and your interests, but you won’t be heard if you don’t speak up.
Be sure to register to vote. The deadline to do so is Tuesday, and you can register to vote or check your registration status at indianavoters.in.gov.
