Ed Gracely wants New Jersey to extend its Clean Elections program to cover all legislative races and Charlotte Templin thinks it's time for Indiana to move towards a full public financing option for state legislators. Read both of their letters to the editor after the jump.

From the Courier Post:

I strongly support an effort by leaders in the state Legislature to renew a pilot program for public financing of elections. Public funding of elections is the best method to reduce the influence of moneyed special interests in politics.

The small amount of money spent on public financing pays for itself many times over in clean, efficient, decision making by our elected officials. It also opens up the political process to people who would not otherwise have been able to afford to run for office.

It is time to extend public funding to all legislative races statewide. We've learned a lot from the two test years and there are other states that have useful models we can learn from, as well. Let's move forward.

ED GRACELY

Sicklerville

Thank you for the editorial on the need for lobbying reform ("Cost of influence-peddling soft-pedaled too long," Jan. 8). Indiana legislators are evidently happy with the present system in which members are allowed to accept gifts -- even substantial ones -- from special interests and keep those gifts secret. Our legislators should be embarrassed by this state of affairs, and so should all Hoosiers. We should not permit a system in which special interests are allowed to offer "soft" bribes to influence legislators who should be serving the people's interests.


The bills offered by Rep. John Day and Sen. Mike Delph are a good start; but to fully remedy the situation we need public funding of campaigns. Public funding would make legislators accountable to their constituents rather than to special interests. The Indiana Clean Elections Coalition (www.indianacleanelections.org) is working to improve our system, drawing on models from states such as Maine and Arizona that have already adopted clean election systems.


Charlotte Templin
Indianapolis

Great letters both.