COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — There are many school board seats open in several districts in the Pikes Peak region. A local grassroots non-profit called Church Voter Guides is helping people get informed before they cast their vote in the school board election.

“Whatever the candidate submitted–that’s what is going into the guide,” Church Voter Guides Project Coordinator Chaim Goldman said.

It is a simple way to get to know each candidate running for a district’s school board. They asked each candidate the same eight questions on subjects such as the budget, CRT, sex education, and COVID mandates. Each of the candidates had 120 words to answer each question.

“We wanted to do a non-partisan voter guide that could also get inside churches–501-3c organizations that normally don’t want to touch politics–so we came up with this guide to ask all of the candidates the same question and print exactly what they responded,” Goldman explained. “We asked pretty neutral questions, but questions where Christians care about, because it is specifically designed to go into churches.”

The organizers of the non-profit printed out 30,000 business cards with their website on the back to get the word out about this voter guide around town. They also wanted to make the voter guides accessible for everyone.

“We didn’t print these up. We made it easy for people to get from their phones and computers,” Goldman said.

On the website, you can also watch School Board Candidate Forums. For those candidates who didn’t participate, the voter guide still has their names and email addresses to contact them. The idea of a voter guide was created at the beginning of 2021 for the Colorado Springs City Council election.

“What people need to realize this isn’t just about the children, and of course that is the most important thing, but there are hundreds of millions of dollars worth of tax money that is being spent by these boards in these different districts and so really everyone and everyone in the United States but definitely here in our home town, should be concerned about this and should get out to vote,” Goldman said.

The ChurchVoterGuides.org site also has a map to show you what school district you live in. Church Voter Guides want to do this not just for the Pikes Peak region but want to roll out to other cities nationally by the spring.

“People all over the country can get a hold of these tools–these ideas–how we did it and say ‘I want to do it in my hometown’ and put it out, because a group of a few people relatively who are grassroots and love their city. This can be done,” Goldman said.

Voters have until Tuesday, Nov. 2nd at 7 p.m. to cast their ballot.