Time to question Whangarei's mayoral candidates

Northern Advocate editor Craig Cooper. PHOTO/MICHAEL CUNNINGHAM

ON Tuesday night (September 20) if you live in Whangarei we are inviting you to come along and hear your local mayoral candidates speak at the Forum North Te Kotahitanga Expo Hall.

And we want to include your questions as part of the evening's programme.

Send us a question for the Whangarei mayoral candidates, and we'll choose six questions - one for each candidate - to ask.

There is one wee catch - it has to be a question that can be asked of any candidate. We do this for a quite specific reason, to be fair.

In 2013, when the Advocate organised the first mayoral forum with The Hits and Northland Chamber of Commerce, we toyed with the idea of questions for individual candidates. But we found that candidates were being asked different degrees of questions - some were being quizzed harder than others.

Tuesday evening isn't a debate, it is a presentation-style evening at which the candidates are given three minutes to give you an opening address, and two minutes to close.

In between, we will introduce them (of course) and ask them business-related questions, and general questions from Advocate readers or The Hits listeners.

The candidates are invited to stay after the meeting and mingle with voters. You are welcome to approach them with individual questions after the meeting.

We are also going to ask you to vote on the night in a "straw poll".

You'll be given a programme for the evening, and at the night's conclusion (about 7.15pm to 7.30pm) we want you to tick a box next to the person who impressed you most, and pop it in our collection box.

Last election, the expo hall was packed out. And the straw poll proved to be accurate, with the winner on the night - Sheryl Mai - taking the mayoralty.
Have a think - it's your chance to put a candidate on the spot and hit them with a curly one about Whangarei's future.

Send your questions to editor@northernadvocate.co.nz