Jack Thompson is a senior at Greens Farms Academy, and co-chairs the Westport Youth Commission. He helped produce last year’s 1st selectman candidate debate at Toquet Hall, and looked forward to a similar role with this year’s election. Jack writes:
I joined the Westport Youth Commission because student engagement in local government is rare, and being part of this organization would let me be heard.
I put that to the test last year, when I helped organize a first selectman forum as a lead-up to the election. It was a great learning experience, and opened a lot of eyes on how students can be engaged in the political process.
Jack Thompson (left) and Jake Shufro, at last year’s Westport Youth Commission 1st selectman candidates’ debate.
This year, a candidate running for the 136th state House of Representatives approached the WYC about holding a similar forum.
We did some research, and learned that the League of Women Voters has been unable to hold candidate events due to their “empty chair” policy. Due to their nonpartisan position (us too!), they can’t hold events with only one candidate.
We felt that both the town and candidates were losing out, as these events provide important, symbiotic context: We as citizens learn our candidates’ positions, and they learn what’s important to us.
With that in mind, we wanted to see what we could do. We started planning a candidate event for October 29. We invited both Democrat Lee Goldstein and Republican Douglas Ouellette, with the stipulation that both needed to agree for us to host the event.
Screenshot from Ballotpedia, a site that offers “unbiased information to educate and inform American voters.”
We only heard from Lee Goldstein, who responded “yes,” so, in accordance with LWV policy, we canceled the event. This was extremely unfortunate, as it would have provided all of Westport’s citizens and youth an opportunity to hear from the candidates running to represent them in Hartford.
So what do we do now? As a group, we debated next steps and decided not to be deterred.
We are exploring an event after the election that would be sponsored by the LWV, and moderated by Dan Woog and students.
There are two reasons we arrived at this decision: We want to raise student political engagement and awareness, and it provides an opportunity for our new state representatives to hear from us, about what’s important and how we want to be represented.
It will also give students a chance to share their stance on issues we care about, like AI, social media and local transportation.
We plan to make it technology-interactive, with a live polling system so representatives can see how Westport citizens feel about key issues.
My fellow WYC members and I are excited to plan this event, and look forward to sharing more details after the election.
(“Students Speak” is a forum for all students, who live in or attend school in Westport and Weston. Email submissions to 06880blog@gmail.net. To support this hyper-local blog, click here. Thank you!)
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Meanwhile, the Leagues of Women Voters of Lower Fairfield County are sponsoring a debate with the 3 candidates for Congress from Connecticut’s 4th District: Democratic Jim Himes, Republican Michael Goldstein and independent Benjamin Wesley.
It’s Monday, October 19 (Westport Library, 7 p.m.). Advance registration is required; click here. The debate will also be livestreamed on the Library’s YouTube page, with replay available afterward.
