Elections Letter Policy: 2013 General Election

September 12, 2013

The Geauga County Maple Leaf welcomes and encourages letters to the editor as well as residents’ opinions and endorsements on the upcoming elec-tions.
We reserve the right to edit all sub-missions for accuracy, taste and grammar. We reserve the right to condense letters for space purposes. Letters should be no more than 300 words in length.
Letters will be published as space permits. If more letters are received than can be published in any issue, we will publish a representative sample.
We reserve the right to refuse letters we consider unsuitable or unfit for publication. We expect all writers to discourse in a polite way, without stooping to name-calling or unverifiable charges of misconduct.
The Letters to the Editor feature is not a battleground for repeated arguing between opposing parties. Rebuttals are welcome; successive volleys are not. No more than two letters by a single writer on a specific topic will be published in a three-month period.
Only political advertisements placed by a candidate or a candidate’s repre-sentative(s) will be accepted. These advertisements will concern themselves with the issues of the campaign and/or the experience and qualifications of the candidate.
Letters to the Editor supporting or opposing a candidate will be accepted. We will, however, not run letters with deliberate or vague negative remarks or references about an opponent or another candidate. Any letter opposing a particular candidate, however, must also contain an endorsement of another candidate.
Letters containing libelous or slanderous statements, or unsub-stantiated allegations of wrongdoing will be rejected.
Letters are due no later than 5 p.m. Friday for publication in the following week’s edition. The final deadline for election letters is 5 p.m. Oct. 25, for publication in the Oct. 31 edition. Letters published on Oct. 31 will be limited to candidate and issue endorsements, except as permitted below.
The final deadline for letters critical of candidates is 5 p.m. Oct. 18, for publication in the Oct. 24 edition. Letters from candidates in response to letters specifically critical of them will be accepted until 5 p.m. Oct. 25, for publ-ication in the Oct. 31 edition.
No more than one letter from an individual will be published in a 30-day period. All letters must include the writer’s name, address and daytime and evening telephone numbers. If the letter is published, only the name and town will be used in the paper.
We do not publish form letters or letters written to other publications.
Unless otherwise noted, columns on the editorial page reflect the opinions of the writers and do not necessarily reflect those of the Geauga County Maple Leaf.