League of Women Voters of Great Bend will host a forum for political candidates at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Great Bend High School Auditorium. The forum will include candidates for Great Bend City Council, Barton County Commission, and the U.S. House of Representatives.
The forum will be moderated by Rose Kelly, voter service leader for LWV.
Great Bend League of Women Voters President Becky Dudrey explained that a forum differs from a debate. There will be no questions from the floor. The candidates will draw from a prepared pool of questions on a variety of subjects.
This is not a town hall, so there will be no vocal audience participation. The audience will be free to visit with the candidates beforehand, at the intermission, and after the forum. There will be no formal campaigning at the forum.
LWV is a non-partisan organization dedicated to informing the voting public about national, state, and local issues of importance. The Great Bend chapter has a new website, lwvgreatbend.org, and is also on face book. LWV suggests going to Vote411 website to read about the candidates for state and federal offices.
Forum participants
Candidates participating for U.S. Representative will be Alan LaPolice and Nick Reinecker. Rep. Roger Marshall will be in Washington so he will not be able to participate.
Candidates for Barton County Commission will be Alicia (Schartz) Strab and Randy Suchy.
Candidates for City Council for Ward 1 are Bobby Lee Roller, Alan Moeder, Bradley McCune, Josh Ellis and Jessica Milsap. Ward 2 will be James Breitenbach and Chad Summers. Ward 3 will be Dana Dawson and Jacob R. Davis.
Other candidates
Candidates who are running uncontested will be introduced but will not speak from the stage. These include Rep. Tory Marie Arnberger, who is unopposed in her bid for the Republican nomination as Kansas House of Representatives, 112th District, and Brock McPherson, who in unopposed as he seeks reelection to the Great Bend City Council.
Candidates for judge were not invited because state law prohibits them from this type of campaigning, Dudrey said.
Live streaming
The Great Bend Tribune will provide live streaming of the forum on our Facebook page, www.facebook.com/gbtribune/.
