Editorial: What do you want to ask the mayoral candidates

Hawke's Bay Today Editor Andrew Austin

It is not too long to go to the local government elections and before you know it, you will have received your voting papers.

Voting papers are being sent out between 16-21 September. You will then have until noon on election day, October 8, to get your vote in.

You will have noticed that Hawke's Bay Today has begun covering the elections in earnest and you will see even more during the next two weeks.

We have started doing profiles on the candidates and we will continue doing so. This will give you a chance to see who wants to represent you and what they stand for. We also will be running an election supplement soon with more profiles and some general information about elections.

There are other features that will begin appearing soon, but the big event this week will be our mayoral debate in Hastings. This Thursday at 6pm in the Karamu High School hall, the three people standing for Hastings mayor - Adrienne Pierce, Guy Wellwood and Lawrence Yule - will square off in what should be a fascinating contest.

It does not stop there, because next week we will be doing the same thing down in Central Hawke's Bay where, whatever happens, a new mayor will be elected. Peter Butler is standing down and we have three candidates - Sally Butler, Gerard Pain and Alex Walker - ready to take over from him.

All three have agreed to debate each other at the meeting we are hosting with the CHB Mail. it will be held on Tuesday, September 13 at the CHB Municipal Theatre in Waipawa.

It will be my pleasure to moderate both events and we have invited readers to send in questions they would like me to ask. We are not taking any questions from the floor, so this is your opportunity to ask anything.

Already I have some very interesting questions that will test the mettle of the candidates, but send me some more. You can email them to editor@hbtoday.co.nz.

This is your chance to get the information you need to make an informed decision.