This has been a long, hard election season. We are sure that most of you are relieved to not be bombarded by state and national political ads and banter. The political ads for governor’s race were particularly degrading and disgusting.

We want to thank all of our local candidates for their efforts, nights and days of constant pressing the flesh, evening after evening of debates and hours on the cell phone.

Obviously everyone can’t win. We salute those who lost and thank them for their willingness to serve their community.

We also praise the voters of Newton County for some wise decisions.

We feel Lanier Sims will be a breath of fresh air for the voters of District 2 and for the whole county.

We were concerned about the Board of Education, but the elections of Shakila Henderson-Baker, Abigail Morgan-Coggin and Jeff Meadors help ease those concerns.

We think that Jeff Jeffers will be a solid replacement for John Douglas as our state senator. He has a good local government background.

Toney "No show" Collins was as bad as a state house representative as you could ever have. Having Pam Dickerson as our representative has to be a plus.

We are in desperate need of solid good leadership here in Newton County. We are counting on our new elected officials to provide the effective leadership that we need to help us reach our potential as a county.