University of Wisconsin - Extension

With nearly a week gone by since the primary, the election season is now fully in swing. Wisconsin Pubic Television (WPT) and Wisconsin Public Radio (WPR) are hoping to ease the way for citizens wanting to participate in democracy by offering a Wisconsin Vote Web site that serves as an issues and candidate primer.

The general election takes place on Nov. 7 and features races for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, United States Senate and many more offices. There also are two proposed changes to the state’s constitution on the ballot.

http://Wisconsinvote.org, jointly managed by WPR and WPT, will provide accessible, up-to-date, thorough and unbiased information on these candidates and campaigns.

“This site is part of the overall commitment by the dedicated journalists at Wisconsin Public Radio and our counterparts at Wisconsin Public Television to provide the people of this state with the most complete election coverage and candidate information possible,” said Michael Leland, news director for WPR.

There will be streaming audio and video of news coverage, links to candidate sites and archived print media stories. A new feature is an RSS feed, which allows people to sign up for aggregated alerts when just-posted election material is available on various online sites. The alerts are sent directly to e-mail in-boxes.

“We’re pleased to play a positive role in educating potential voters about who is standing for office and about two statewide ballot initiatives that could alter the state constitution,” said Kathy Bissen, WPT’s interim director of production.

WPR and WPT are services of the Educational Communications Board and University of Wisconsin-Extension.

WPR consists of 27 stations programmed by seven regional studios and carrying programming from the two WPR networks – the Ideas Network and the NPR News & Classical Music Network.

WPT is a place to grow through learning on WHA-TV/DT, Madison; WPNE-TV/DT, Green Bay; WHRM-TV/DT, Wausau; WLEF-TV/DT, Park Falls; WHLA-TV/DT, La Crosse; and WHWC-TV/DT, Menomonie-Eau Claire.