Voters Guide in St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Oct. 26<\/h2>\n

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch —\u00a0 in collaboration with the League of Women Voters — will include a comprehensive Voters Guide as a supplement in the [Friday] October 26 daily newspaper.\u00a0 [They do this for every election, including primaries.] The guide will include all the information on the Vote411 website–but it won’t be customized for individual addresses. It covers St. Louis City, St. Louis County, St. Charles County, Franklin County and Jefferson County. You’ll be able to read all of the ballot language for all of the amendments and proposals, plus review all candidates for federal, state and local offices, including their statements about themselves and their positions on current issues. The guide also contains the names and “scores” for all judges up for retention. It’s a very useful tool. We should applaud the Post-Dispatch and the League of Women Voters for this huge undertaking–and we should be glad that we still have a daily newspaper in our region.<\/p>\n

If you don’t subscribe to the daily edition, you can pick up a copy of the guide at your local library [the League of Women Voters has a volunteer corps that delivers bundles of them throughout the region]. Copies are also available at churches, synagogues and the offices of many non-profit organizations that request them.<\/p>\n

Hint: Make yourself a \u201ccheat sheet\u201d to take to your polling place<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s not cheating to take your own notes into the polling place. A so-called \u201ccheat sheet\u201d will help you remember what each proposition is about, and how you may have decided to vote when you had the time to review them in advance.<\/p>\n

Note<\/strong>: I recently voted absentee in-person, and saw for myself the value of a cheat sheet. The\u00a0electronic voting machines in St. Louis County include a review screen that appears after you have finished voting on the issues and candidates. That\u2019s where you check to make sure that you voted the way you wanted to, and that the machine recorded your preferences correctly. But here\u2019s the thing: On the ballot issues and amendments, the review screen does not state the issue\u00a0associated with each amendment or proposition\u2014so you might not remember what, for example, Proposition D was. That\u2019s when a crib sheet listing the item and its topic comes in very handy. Here\u2019s my crude version for St. Louis County.<\/p>\n

Read, Google, Ask<\/h2>\n

Whatever you do, don\u2019t get blind-sided by the ballot on Election Day. If you walk in prepared, you\u2019ll congratulate yourself on being an informed voter. When you see the actual ballot\u2014or scroll through the many screens\u2014you\u2019ll be glad you studied up. And the people in line behind you will thank you, too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Need a sample ballot? Many Missouri voters are worrying about the 2018 midterm ballot. We\u2019ve been warned: It\u2019s unusually long. It includes a slew<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":39221,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2953,573,3305],"tags":[3303,120,3304],"yoast_head":"\n