On Thursday, Terri heard about a forum being held at a local church, featuring candidates for the Kern High School District Board of Trustees.  The forum was organized and led by Faith in Action Kern County, a coalition of local churches.  When we heard that some of the churches involved in our local 40 Days for Life campaign are a part of this coalition, we were hopeful that the forum might provide some useful insight on who to vote for in the coming election.  Our hopes, however, were short-lived.

With Proposition 8 and Proposition 4 on the ballot, we had hoped to have an opportunity to ask the candidates for their positions on issues such as teaching homosexuality, sex education and abortion.  But as the forum was being introduced, we learned that the candidates would only be asked six, pre-selected questions, and that no additional questions would be answered at the forum.

We had hoped that perhaps the pre-selected questions might still give us an opportunity to learn the candidates’ positions on these key moral issues, but instead we learned that the questions focused on the following areas:

• Student achievement
• Vision for youth
• Drop-out rate
• CSU/UC readiness
• State budget
• and High school visits

Reviewing the list of issues being presented, we realized that the forum was not going to provide us with any of the information we were seeking.  As we left, Terri and I filled out comment forms indicating our disappointment at the way the forum completely ignored the key moral issues facing us in this election.

If we can find time in the next few days, we hope to personally contact as many of the candidates as possible, trying to learn their positions on these moral issues.  We then hope to post their responses online in an effort to help us vote more wisely.

If you can help in this effort (by data entry, making phone calls, etc.) please contact us as soon as possible. You can call me at (661) 972-1052.