Dressed for active duty, Dan Montoya stands in front of a Marine Corps tank with its metallic treads and gun turret. The photograph has been placed on his campaign website to let you know that he is a 20-year U.S Marine veteran.

Dan is running for the District 28 seat in the Colorado House of Representatives. It is located in the Littleton area in Jefferson County in the southwestern suburbs of Denver.

His campaign website also tells that he is a native Coloradan who was raised in southwest Denver. Now that his Marine Corps service is over, he wants to go on serving the public in the Colorado state legislature.

With the just a few clicks on your desktop or laptop computer or cell phone, you can visit the campaign website of his opponent, Democrat Sheila Lieder.

She is pictured in front of a typical upscale suburban home with an American flag flying at the front door. Her website notes she has been a merit badge counselor for the Boy Scouts of America, and her son is an Eagle Scout. Among other volunteer activities, she has been a labor lobbyist for her fellow telecom workers,a member of the Jefferson County Democratic Latino Initiative (JDLI), and has been elected as her homeowner association’s president and vice president.

There is a photograph of Sheila Lieder talking with a construction worker.

The race between Republican Dan Montoya and Democrat Sheila Lieder is a close one. House District 28 is one of the most competitive legislative districts in Colorado at 51% Democratic to 49% Republican.

It is one of the wonders of the computer age that this kind of detailed information about candidates for public office is so readily available to prospective voters. It is also significant that the candidates themselves appear to have played a major role in choosing the material about them that appears in their campaign websites. In the past, prior to the digital era, a time-consuming visit to the campaign headquarters would have been required to get this kind of detailed electoral information.

Now let’s take a digitized look at House District 19. It is located on the northern Front Range around Erie and Frederick. It too is a highly competitive seat, with a past voting record of 51% Republican to 49% Democratic.

Incumbent Republican Dan Woog is running for reelection. A photograph shows him with two children, and the website text emphasizes his role as a volunteer coach for his children’s various sports teams.

He played ice hockey in college and, as an incumbent state legislator, is the top Republican on the House State, Military, and Veterans Affairs Committee. He served as a trustee for the town of Erie for seven years and on Erie’s Economic Development Council and Planning and Zoning Commission.

The Democrats have recruited a strong competitor to run against the Republican Woog. Jennifer Parenti’s website has an entire section on her career as a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Air Force. She taught Air Force R.O.T.C. (Reserve Officers Training Corps) at the University of Massachusetts. She then became an Air Force international affairs specialist and was posted to the U.S. embassy in Paris. After retiring from the Air Force, she was hired by NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization) to continue working with U.S. allies on strategic planning and international cooperation opportunities.

As you read these candidate biographies on campaign websites, you cannot help but be impressed by the many experienced and talented Coloradans who are available and willing to run for political office. By and large they are joiners and doers who have chalked up some major accomplishments in their lives and careers to date.

But there is something more going on here. These candidate biographies are written to win people’s votes and gain election to an important public office – member of the state legislature. The biographies thus tell us as much about what candidates think voters want as they do about the candidates themselves. When composing their campaign biographies, the candidates are working to shape the facts of their careers to this ideal civic public servant.

That ideal person is seen to be a civic volunteer, concerned about the needs of others, and to have a proven record of accomplishment in community affairs. It does not hurt to have a family and a goodly number of memberships in civic organizations. Candidates also like to show off their dog. We knew one former legislator who borrowed a dog for his campaign literature.        

In southeast Colorado Springs, in Senate District 11, campaign websites reveal two political heavyweights fighting it out for one of the most evenly balanced competitive state Senate districts in Colorado – 51% Democratic to 49% Republican.

Democrat Tony Exum has served several terms in the state House of Representatives and touts his 35 years as a firefighter in Colorado Springs, noting that he retired as a battalion chief. Part of his career was devoted to training the next generation of Springs firefighters. He also mentions officiating at high school and college basketball and softball games and that he has been both a father and a grandfather.

Republican Dennis Hisey tells us he “grew up rural” outside a small town in Oregon and mentions “bucking hay” and “logging” as two youthful activities. A small business owner most of his adult life, he began his electoral career as a county commissioner in El Paso County. He then was elected to the Colorado state Senate. The recent redistricting moved him out of his original state Senate district. He relocated to District 11, which is an open seat.

Hisey notes he is a family man with five children and several grandchildren. His website is filled with multiple photos of him interacting with average citizens of all ages.

Campaign websites are not light reading. We do, however, recommend them as a ready source of information about the candidates who will be seeking your vote in the upcoming November general elections.

Tom Cronin and Bob Loevy write about Colorado and national politics. Review their charts that show the current situation in each Colorado state House district and state Senate district.