Endorsements and breaking news our priorities today

NEW SMYRNA BEACH -- With Tuesday's general election now a day away, our priorities today are endorsements and any major breaking news.

We'll also try and squeeze in our exclusive coverage of the New Smyrna Beach High School Homecoming half-time show. If not today, then Tuesday or Wednesday. We have a lot of ground to cover over the next 36 hours so we appreciate everyone's patience and support as we are providing the kind of in-depth election coverage we believe is important to the voting public.

There are only so many hours in the day and few precious resources, but we are providing the kind of analysis we believe sets a higher standard for media coverage. We hope that everyone gets a chance to review our endorsements as we are the only media outlet in Volusia County willing to speak up.

We promised you from the beginning of the primary season that we would fully vet the politicians seeking elected office. We've kept our word with eight public candidate debates in the primary and seven more leading up to the general election.

We said we would ask the tough questions on issues like the American Music Festival scandal that left Daytona State College with more than a million in the red that was not paid back. And we said we would ask the tough questions that led to the scandal with the Southeast Volusia Advertising Authority.

We don't have the inside business connections of the print media nor do we have their lucrative marketing and advertising agreements and partnerships with government, the big corporations and power brokers, but then again, we don't have the potential conflicts of interest either. We just try and do the best we can with what we have. We couldn't get space for public candidate debates with the colleges, even though we tried.

We were happy and thankful to be able to afford to rent the Brannon Center here in New Smyrna Beach and were appreciative of the use of the chambers at the Oak Hill and Port Orange city hall commission and council chambers, respectively for our debates. We didn't have the clout of being a part of the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce's HobNob debates at the Ocean Center. But then again, we truly are representative of the small business owner worried about providing for one's family. It took everything we had at the time just to pay an annual membership fee. 

Same with Tiger Bay and its exclusive print media debate partnership. They had the first Bruno-Hukill state senate debate, but you can't see it anywhere because it was a private affair (no video or adio recording allowed and admission was not free). But we had the "real Bruno-Hukill public candidate debate" Oct. 20, and it lived up to its billing. You can watch it on our YouTube channel or at the bottom of this column as well as the other post primary debates . We'll be posting the videos again with our endorsements in those races later today.

Again, thank you and please exercise your Democratic right to vote, if you haven't done so already.

We know that not our endorsement choices ae not going to please everyone, espcially those in the Republican or Democratic parties, who have lobbied for their respective candidates, as they should. In the interest of full disclosure in writing the endorsements, this writer's Democratic Party affiliation is disclosed at the end of every write-up.

At the voting booth on Tuesday, the only opinion that really matters is that of you, the voter. Period.

 

 

 

The public candidate debate for the dist. 8 state senate seat between Republican Dorothy Hukill and Democrat Frank Bruno was held Sunday, Oct. 20, at the Brannon Center in New Smyrna Beach. The 90-minute debate drew 200 citizens. The district represents portions of Volusia, Marion and Lake counties.

 

Oak Hill mayoral debate

 

 County Chair Debate

County Council dist 3

 

Port Orange City Council

 

 

State Rep.

County Council 2