In advance of the 2024 elections, City Times Media took an innovative approach to covering the campaigns for the San Diego City College community.
CTM designed a survey, in English and Spanish, to identify issues and elicit questions from the City College community that reporters used to engage political candidates and direct their election reporting.
“Essentially the staff at City Times wants to know, ‘what issues would you like to hear be addressed by the candidates running for California governor as they compete for your vote?’” David J. Bohnet, co-editor-in-chief at CTM, said of the agenda. “Our goal is to develop questions and deliver answers based on the results, but we need your help.”
Click here or scroll down to access the 2026 City College Community Agenda survey.
CTM is bringing back the community agenda survey for the 2026 Primary on June 2 and the General Election in November to hear from the City College community to better direct our election coverage.
Use this link to share your questions for the candidates and the issues that matter to you.
In the upcoming weeks, CTM reporters will share candidate profiles and stories focused on these issues on the City Times Media website and its other platforms, including YouTube, Spotify and other social media pages.
About the City College Community Agenda
The City College Community Agenda is modeled after The Citizens Agenda, a “guide to an audience-centric reporting method that better serves voters.”
A collaboration between professor of journalism at New York University Jay Rosen and “social impact consultancy” Hearken developed the guide to improve election coverage by moving from an approach centered on politicians to reporting on the issues important to communities.
The Citizens Agenda campaign reporting model empowers the people and employs the newsroom to act as a middle man by creating a conduit and translator between the people and the politicians they elect.
City Times Media specifically uses the name “Community Agenda” instead of “Citizens Agenda” to reflect the importance of both U.S. and non-U.S. citizens in the San Diego City College community.
Crow Ruiz contributed to this article.
This story was edited by Nadia Lavin and Briana Bush.
