Ballots are on the way. The Tri-City Herald has some great tools to help you vote | Editorial

Ballots are scheduled to arrive in Tri-City mailboxes this week, and if you already know who to vote for then good for you.

But if you are still not sure, then we have some tools to help you navigate your way through the overwhelming number of candidate websites and political ads.

For starters, the Tri-City Herald has published an in-depth Voter Guide on our website that gives subscribers an opportunity to see how candidates answered questions on many important issues. This includes candidates at the federal, state and local levels.

The information in our guide goes far beyond the candidate statements provided in the official Voters’ Pamphlet provided by the Secretary of State. To get to our Voter Guide, go to the top menu bar of the Tri-City Herald website, or use this link: bit.ly/TriVoterGuide.

When using the guide, be sure and type in your full address. Listing only your city or county won’t work.

In addition to our Voter Guide, the Tri-City Herald Editorial Board is once again making candidate recommendations.

This is a long tradition of the Tri-City Herald and many other newspapers around the country. But despite it being an annual occurrence, there are readers every year who question why we pursue the effort. Many get upset that the newspaper is showing bias by suggesting one candidate is better than the other.

Well, on the Opinion page, we get to be biased. That’s the difference between editorials and news stories.

Reporters do their best to be objective, providing facts about each person running for office. The Tri-City Herald Editorial Board goes beyond the facts and provides perspective. We see our election recommendations as a public service that gives readers an extra level of information to use when you mark your ballots.

Typically, we strive to have three to seven board members participate in our local candidate interviews and help decide our recommendations.

To maintain that number, we have asked some former Tri-City Herald Editorial Board members to participate in the process. This year, our group includes Tri-City Herald Executive Editor Laurie Williams, Herald editorial writer Cecilia Rexus, retired Herald publisher Jack Briggs, retired Herald editorial page editor Matt Taylor, retired Herald executive editor Ken Robertson, and community members Martin Valadez and Lori Lancaster.

Typically, we interview candidates face-to-face in our meeting room. In the past, high profile candidates for governor, attorney general and the state Supreme Court have traveled across the Cascades to seek our backing.

This year, because of COVID-19 restrictions, we knew that the process had to be different.

Instead of meeting in person, we conducted all of our interviews virtually. For the statewide races, this allowed us to team up with our sister newspapers — The News Tribune of Tacoma and The Olympian — in joint discussions with candidates.

While we shared the meetings, that’s where the group effort ended. Each editorial board is making its own recommendation for each state office.

At the local level, we interviewed candidates from Benton and Franklin counties and the 8^th, 9^th and 16^th state legislative districts, as well as the U.S. Congressional 4^th District. As an added bonus, we were able to record many of our interviews, and those recordings will accompany our recommendations.

So if you really want to see a good conversation that goes beyond a scripted Q&A, check out the videos.

In our deliberations, we strive to reach a consensus. Not every recommendation is unanimous. It is also important to note that we select who we think is best suited for the job, regardless of party affiliation.

Many times it is tough to pick one candidate over another because they are both so qualified. When that happens, we point it out. Other times, the choice is clear and we point that out too.

Challengers always have our appreciation. Their willingness to run gives voters a choice, and it allows us to put incumbents on the record and hold them accountable.

We already have weighed in on several races, including the state treasurer’s race, the House seats in the 16th Legislative District and House seats in the 8th Legislative District and in the 9th.

There are more candidate recommendations to come, so keep an eye out.

This story was originally published October 14, 2020 at 12:00 AM.