Early voting in Johnson County is in full swing and Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 7, is upon us.
As Johnson County residents head to the polls and mail in ballots, we’ve put together election primers for each of the local races in the Post’s coverage area to give readers and residents in those communities an easy way to find out more about the candidates and where they stand on the issues important to you.
SHAMELESS PLUG
No other news outlet devotes as much attention to giving Shawnee Mission area voters a way to find out where candidates running for local office stand on the issues facing our community. If you value having a news outlet provide this kind of coverage, we hope you’ll consider becoming a subscriber if you aren’t already. Your first month of full access is just $1.
See who the candidates are
Position 1
- Architect Chad Philhour
- Incumbent board member Bill Fletcher
Position 2
- Marketing executive and incumbent board member Ashley Spaulding
- Business owner and current chair of the Shawnee Board of Zoning Appeals Greg Withrow
Position 3
- Small business owner former JCCC Trustee Henry Sandate
- Bank executive and incumbent board member Stephanie Makalous
Position 7 (At Large)
- Financial advisor Andy Jacober
- Salon owner and substitute teacher Anh-Nguyet Nguyen
Read what candidates say about key issues
- Diversity, equity and inclusion
- Removing books from libraries
- Teacher retention
- Student achievement
- Student mental health
Watch the Post’s candidate forum
The Post hosted a candidate forum for USD 232 school board on Tuesday, Oct. 17, at Mill Valley High School. All the candidates participated.
You can watch the forum in its entirety in the embedded video link below.
Immediately following the video are the questions that candidates answered during each forum. Timestamps are included in bold to help navigate through the forum video.
- Candidate’s opening statements. [4:45]
- What is your biggest priority in the school district? [14:45]
- What do you consider ideal growth in the school district and how would you manage that? [27:30]
- How would you promote academic excellence? [37:45]
- What is your opinion on banning books? [50:30]
- How should the school board deal with issues like mental health for students? [59:00]
- How would you advocate for the needs of USD 232 to the Kansas legislature? [1:08:00]
- How should the city maintain a highly-qualified, professional staff amid this exodus of talent leaving to other cities or do you see this as a problem at all? [25:29]
- Closing remarks [1:23:30]
