Editorial: Help us amass a list of emails for local candidates

Here at the Daily Herald we take elections as seriously as do the candidates running for office. It's the most exhaustive project we undertake each year that there is an election.

And that means a lot more than just coverage of election night.

We write about petition filings and petition challenges, we publish short biographies of candidates and do Q & As on topics important to a particular race.

We attend candidate forums. We invite many candidates in contested elections to interview with members of our editorial board.

And we write endorsements on many races.

Because Illinois has not passed a law requiring candidates for office to include an email address for public consumption when filing nominating petitions (something we wholeheartedly endorse), we spend weeks running down email addresses. Yes, weeks.

So today, we're asking for help. If you are a candidate in a contested race for mayor, village board, city council, school board, library board or park board in the Daily Herald coverage area - or you know someone who is - you can help us in the furtherance of democracy.

We say this with all seriousness. While many other newspaper companies have backed away from election coverage, we do our level best each time to inform you about the candidates. One way we do that is through reporting. Another is through endorsements.

But in some races that are unlikely to generate much news coverage, we feel it's still important to provide a platform for candidates to tell you who they are and what they're all about.

That will help you to make an informed vote.

The Q & As provide a largely unfiltered way for candidates to connect with readers of this newspaper as well as dailyherald.com. That's the least we can do, but it takes a lot of people power to do even that.

Here is where you come in: If you are in a contested race, <URL destination="https://www.dailyherald.com/candidateinfo/">please visit

www.dailyherald.com/candidateinfo and fill out the simple online form</URL>. It will ask for your name, email address, phone number, the office you're running for and the county you live in.

It takes about a minute to fill out.

We are collecting this information so we can email questionnaires to candidates. Some of the info on the form will help us verify the authenticity of the submissions.

We will not send questionnaires in uncontested races.

Whether you are running for mayor, village board, city council, library board or park board, we need to hear from you. Helping us collect email addresses will allow our news staff to spend more time writing about the issues.

And that benefits everyone.

Thank you.