Duct-tape solution

Welcome to this week’s Reno News & Review.

So the Reno News & Review did this really cool thing. Starting about nine months ago (OK, three years ago, when we decided to move the Best of Northern Nevada so it wouldn’t impact Election 2012 coverage), I started interviewing partners to help us have a great election site. We selected Democracy Live because they promised to include our local “down-ballot” races.

At any rate, problems were had. The RN&R did our part. Most of the candidates did theirs by responding to an online questionnaire. The Washoe County Registrar of Voters did its job. (In fact, during this election, I’ve been floored by the level of competency of the Registrar’s office, particularly Brian Takemoto and Luanne Cutler, while Registrar Dan Burk is out, having had emergency surgery.) Democracy Live experienced innumerable technical difficulties, first promising a Sept. 28 launch, then an Oct. 5 launch, then a whole variety of dates and reasons for delays.

All the while, our readers were deprived of the information they needed.

So, anyway, our operations team, led by John Bisignano and Jonathan Schultz, went into action, creating a down-and-dirty gadget based on the responses the candidates gave us. If I’m able, I’ll also link to candidates’ info on the Registrar’s site for those who didn’t respond to us.

Today is Tuesday. I have no idea what the site is going to look like come Thursday, but I know people are voting now, and I want those voters to see what the candidates had to say. For all I know, Democracy Live may have gotten their act together. Our duct-tape solution may not be beautiful, but it couldn’t wait any longer.

Please go to www.newsreview.com/reno/liveballot. Plug in your address, and you’ll get some combination of what Democracy Live did along with information from the candidates. It may not be pretty, but you’ll get the information you need.