FAIRHOPE, Ala. — With seven candidates running for mayor and 11 vying for five City Council places in the Aug. 26 municipal elections, obtaining meaningful information about this large field can be daunting for Fairhope residents.

But an upcoming candidate questionnaire, three candidate forums, current campaign finance reports and other Internet sources provide several opportunities for local voters to make sense of the elections, scheduled for less than five weeks from today.

During the next month, we will be reporting on these events, giving the results of the questionnaire, covering the forums and including data from the campaign finance reports. We will also be looking for other stories about the campaigns and candidates.

This article is meant to be a quick-and-easy guide to some of these information sources and upcoming events. If there are others sources, opportunities, stories or events we have missed, do not hesitate to contact us.

Candidate forums

Two mayoral forums and one City Council candidate forum provide three opportunities in the next three weeks to watch the candidates in action as they explain their positions and answer questions from moderators and the audience.

Aug. 5 and 7

The first two forums are co-sponsored by the nonpartisan Citizens for Responsible Government and the Eastern Shore Chamber of Commerce. They will be broadcast live from the Civic Center on WABF Radio, 1220 AM.

Both forums start at 7 p.m., with the mayoral forum lasting until 8:30 p.m. and the City Council forum until 9 p.m.

The mayoral forum is Tuesday, Aug. 5 and will be moderated by Kenny Graves of WHEP radio. The council forum is Thursday, Aug. 7 and will be moderated by Lori DuBose of WABF radio.

The candidates in both forums will have two-minute openings and closings, with questions presented by the moderator developed in advance by the sponsoring organizations and submitted that night from the audience on index cards. Questions may also be sent before the event to Gary Govers, vice president of CRP, by e-mail to govers@bellsouth.net, or by regular mail to Gary Govers 300 Lincoln St., Fairhope, AL 36532.

“The forums are an opportunity for the candidates to describe and expand on their platforms,” Govers said. “They are also an opportunity for the public to gain additional information for their voting determinations.”

Aug. 14

The third forum is a mayoral forum sponsored by the Fairhope Downtown Business Association, Thursday, Aug. 14, 6:30-8:30 p.m., at the Eastern Shore Art Center.

“The candidates will have five minutes to state their positions and platforms, and then each will get two questions, but they may not be the same questions,” said Pete Blohme, owner of Panini Pete’s restaurant, who will be moderating the event. “Obviously, we’re very concerned how the election will play out and how it will affect the downtown businesses. We hope there will be a good turnout.”

Blohme said the focus of the questions will be from the perspective of downtown merchants, and that the questions will be developed based on input from the FDBA and research about the candidates.

“We felt with the number of candidates involved, we should just focus on the mayoral candidates first,” he said. “If we get the opportunity, we may also do one for the council races.”

Candidate questionnaire

In addition to co-sponsoring two candidate forums, the Eastern Shore Chamber of Commerce will also be publishing the answers to five questions asked of all the mayoral and City Council candidates in Fairhope. The chamber expects to have the reports ready by the week of the first candidate forums and will post them on their Web site at that time. The Fairhope Courier will also publish the answers to some of the questions at that time.

“The purpose of this project is to educate our members and to also give the candidates another way to communicate their platforms,” said Darrelyn Bender, ESCOC president/CEO. “The questions were developed from questionnaires from other areas and went through our governmental affairs committee, as well as the board of directors for the final form.”

The candidates had until July 25 to answer the follow questions: “(1) What is your previous experience or involvement with business? (2) Outline your top three priorities if you are elected. (3) Name the taxes or fees that impact businesses and residents that you would support increasing, and for what purpose? (4) Do you support the City’s decision to financially partner and support the Chamber of Commerce’s Blueprint for Tomorrow strategic plan and would you pledge to continue that support and consider future support on similar initiatives? (5) What steps would you take to ensure that your city planning department is coordinating with peers in adjoining sister cities and the county?”

Bender said, “This is the first year we have done this for the Fairhope elections.”

Internet sources

Many of the mayoral and City Council candidates have campaign Web sites. Several Internet forums and news sites offer information on candidates and plenty of personal opinions about the candidates (e.g. the Baldwin Forum at www.al.com and www.baldwinreport.com). And the Gulf Coast Newspapers Web site contains information about the candidates at www.baldwincountynow.com.

Ethics information

The forms that public officials must file each year and that candidates must file upon qualifying to run are called “Statement of Economic Interests” forms. The forms help the Alabama Ethics Commission, the agency where the forms are filed, the media, public, prosecutors and others, determine possible conflicts of interest and violation of state ethics law by officials. The forms are available upon request from the Alabama Ethics Commission via a form at the agency’s Web site at www.ethics.alalinc.net. That site also provides links to the Alabama State Ethics Law, lists of registered lobbyists and a searchable database of ethics opinions decided by the agency.

State election law

information

The Web site of the Alabama Secretary of State’s Office (www.sos.state.al.us/Elections/Default.aspx) provides links to the state Fair Campaign Practices Act, a search engine of state office holder campaign finance reports, and lists of Political Action Committees and other election information.

County election

information, including local finance reports

The Web site of the Baldwin County Probate Court (www.co.baldwin.al.us/Pageview.asp?edit_id=35) provides a calendar of election events and other information. That site is also where you will find the candidates’ campaign finance reports. The Probate Court scans the forms and posts them in a searchable database found at http://www.deltacomputersystems.com/al/al05/drlinkqueryf.html.

All candidates are required to file these reports when their campaigns have raised $1,000. The first cycle of reports called the 45-50 day reports has been filed and the last cycle, called the 5-10 day reports, must be filed by July 21.

“Campaign finance information is an important tool for voters trying to make informed choices at the polls,” said Will Barrett, program manager of the California Voter Foundation. “Being able to follow the money is great shortcut for finding out which interest groups are backing a candidate so voters can decide if they share those interests.”

The CVF is part of The Campaign Disclosure Project, a collaboration of the UCLA School of Law and Center for Governmental Studies, which classifies and evaluates campaign disclosure laws of the 50 states, and designs and promotes a set of uniform standards and model laws. The Web site of the project is found at www.campaigndisclosure.org.

“Easy access to campaign finance information is also important after the election is decided,” Barrett said. “Disclosure records allow the public to make sure that their elected officials aren't favoring the parties, (groups or individuals) that funded their campaigns over the interests of the public.”

The last day for Fairhope residents to register to vote is Aug. 15, said a county election official.