By Flint. Daily. and EVM Staff

With the mayor and all nine Flint City Council seats on the ballot this year, the 2026 elections in the City of Flint stand to significantly reshape our local government. 

Absentee ballots are now available and campaigns are well underway as the Aug. 4 primary approaches – a primary that will narrow the races for mayor and the first, second, fifth, and eighth ward council seats down to two candidates each.

And while the city is rich in candidates, we’re short on time to get to know many of them before mailing back ballots or heading to the polls. That’s why East Village Magazine and Flint. Daily. are collaborating to provide election coverage in both publications to reach as many Flint voters as possible. 

Our priority is simple: we want to provide information to Flint’s voters in a way that is fair, timely, and provides the same platform and opportunity to all candidates. That begins with a questionnaire that went out to all official candidates for the August primary election today, June 29, to each candidate’s publicly-available email address from their filing paperwork. (Note: questionnaires for candidates, including official write-in candidates, in races for the November general election will go out at a later date). We have asked candidates to return that questionnaire by Monday, July 6, and we plan to begin publishing those responses (compiled by candidacy – mayor or council ward) starting July 8.

The questions sent to candidates were determined through discussions between editorial leadership of both publications and informed by two Flint. Daily. anonymous surveys conducted earlier this year that asked readers what local issues they cared about most heading into city council and mayoral elections. Those surveys had nearly 200 respondents, with every ward in the city represented among those who participated.

Here are a few other notes on transparency:

  • Candidates were sent questions through a Google form that limits the number of characters they are able to use for responses. This is to provide an equal amount of space for each candidate to address the question. 
  • Only light editing will be done to candidate responses if formatting/readability changes (like bolding text, for example) are necessary to make them easier to read online, or for correcting minor typographical errors that don’t alter the meaning of their response.
  • If a candidate provides a response that is not factual based on an available public record (like a court document, video of a public meeting, quote in a news report, etc.), their response will still run as they submitted it. However, we will add a note to the response that points out the discrepancy and the source where we verified that information. 
  • All candidates were contacted through email addresses they provided on their filing paperwork. If they do not respond to the email, they will be contacted through the phone number they provided on that same paperwork. If they do not submit responses by the deadline, it will be noted in the story about that particular race in the election that a candidate did not respond.
  • For candidates who prefer to respond to questions verbally and have their responses transcribed rather than through the Google Form, we have offered to provide accommodation for those requests. 
  • We asked every candidate a question about any charges or convictions for violent or financial crimes. We did NOT ask that question because we believe anyone’s criminal history should disqualify them from holding public office. Rather, the question is intended to give candidates a chance to address any public records or accusations that may exist. This allows them to directly respond to voters and address those instances in their own words.

East Village Magazine and Flint. Daily. will continue to collaborate on election coverage through the November election. A similar process will be used to highlight candidates in the November races, and that process will also be shared with readers. For questions, please email team@flintdaily.news or eastvillagemagazineflint@gmail.com.