The League of Women Voters of Richardson sponsored forums during the week of April 11 for candidates in the Richardson ISD board of trustees May election for districts 2 and 5.
Recorded via Zoom without an audience, the forums used questions from the public and from the league itself. All 57 questions were screened according to the League of Women Voters of Texas Guide to Candidates Forums.
Both the District 2 forum and the District 5 forum can be found online.
A total of three candidates are vying for the single-member District 2 seat: incumbent Eron Linn, Sherry Clemens and Vanessa Pacheco.
The three candidates running in the single-member District 5 race are Kile Brown, Rachel McGowan and Jan Stell. The District 5 seat has remained vacant since Sept. 24 after former board President Karen Clardy resigned.
Board members in the school district serve three-year staggered terms and are not subject to term limits. Five of the seven seats on the board are chosen by registered voters of specific districts, while the remaining two seats are elected at large. This voting system is the result of a lawsuit settled in early 2019 that accused the board of Voting Rights Act violations.
Early voting for the May 7 election is scheduled to take place April 25-May 3.
The League of Women Voters of Richardson's Voters Guide for the May 7 election is now available. This includes the RISD races, two proposed amendments to the Texas Constitution, and the Dallas College board of trustees District 1 and District 3 races.
A printed version of the Voters Guide can be found at five locations within Richardson: the Richardson Public Library, Richardson City Hall, the Richardson Senior Center, the Heights Recreation Center and the Huffhines Rec Center. Three Dallas libraries within RISD will also have printed versions of the guide: the Fretz Park Branch Library, the Audelia Road Branch Library and the Forest Green Branch Library.
The League of Women Voters is a nonpartisan civic nonprofit that works to increase understanding of major public policy issues and informs the community through education and advocacy, according to the league’s website. Membership is open to anyone age 16 and older.
Jackson King joined Community Impact Newspaper as a reporter in January of 2022. He graduated in 2020 from Texas A&M with a degree in journalism. Jackson covers education, local government, business, development, real estate, transportation and nonprofits in the Richardson community. Prior to CI, he covered sports for the Wylie News, interned at Maroon Weekly and Insite Brazos Valley Magazine in College Station, Texas, and wrote freelance for the Dallas Morning News.
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