The second election season began last Tuesday as qualifying began for the municipal elections.

A few candidates have already announced their bids for public office, while others have not yet been run in the paper. We would like to do the same for all candidates who will share their information with us.

If you haven’t already turned yours in, here are a few guidelines to take into consideration when you are writing your announcement story.

Announcement stories are limited to 200 words in length. They also include a standard photo of the person running for office. Candidates need to list basic information including family, education and careers in their stories.

Each candidate has the opportunity to submit one story for publication that we will use to acquaint our readers with each candidate. We will run the announcement story as information to our readers and at no charge to the candidate until Aug. 1, the deadline for submitted announcement stories.

Qualifying ends July 15 and the deadline gives candidates two additional weeks to submit stories. We look forward to working with each of the candidates.