MiVote.org Redefines Voter Guides,
Puts Voters in Touch with State Candidates

Guest Column
by Rich Homburg
July 30, 2010

Michigan’s 2010 elections are different front any election we’ve known in our lifetimes.

First, the state is seeing an unprecedented number of empty seats because term limits have forced the retirements of Governor Jennifer Granholm, Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land, Attorney General Mike Cox, 29 of 38 state senators and 34 of 110 state representatives.

Throw in at least four hotly contested congressional races, and the state of Michigan could see wholesale change come January.

Second, technology has changed the way citizens interact with each other and is changing their expectations about how they are involved in the political process. Facebook and other social media applications have empowered people to have their say, and to interact directly — virtually — with candidates.

MiVote.org is a nonpartisan, educational website designed to facilitate those conversations. The product of a collaboration between Detroit Public Television, the University of Michigan-Dearborn and The Center for Michigan, MiVote.org attempts to redefine voter guides.

MiVote.org has published traditional candidate profiles, along with demographic data and statistics on individual districts. What makes MiVote.org unique, however, is providing a common platform for more than 200 candidates in open-seat races to address voters directly.

All the candidates must address four key issues facing the state: what they’d do about the economy and how they would create more jobs, their views on education, their approach to balance government budgets, and their agenda, if any, for reforming government in Michigan.

By viewing videos, potential voters have the chance to experience each candidate, hear each candidate’s views, and chat with other potential voters on the candidate’s message and qualifications. In addition, individual citizens can post their own videos, expounding their own views of the key issues facing Michigan, and telling what they — as citizens — think should happen.

MiVote.org’s mission also extends to education, offering a curriculum guide and suggested lesson plans, so that teachers can take the message of civic responsibility into the classroom and prepare future voters.

Media outlets and community organizations all over Michigan are embracing MiVote.org’s mission, adopting this public media content as an important resource to support their goals in the 2010 election campaign. Newspapers and television stations are using MiVote.org’s videos to help their readers and listeners learn more about the election. Voters are also responding, visiting the site in unprecedented numbers.

We believe MiVote.org provides a unique opportunity. It’s the closest most voters will ever get to a one-on-one conversation with a candidate, without the filters of headlines, sound bites, and glaring lights and slogans.

Watch a few videos and you’ll likely be impressed — as we were — with the passion, public-spiritedness and just plain caring expressed by many candidates running for office in Michigan in 2010.

And caring…is where the rubber meets the road for Michigan’s future.

Rich Homburg is president and general manager of Detroit Public Television.