The Democrats in Smithfield have been loudly wailing about "negative campaigning" which itself is actually a form of "negative campaigning." Additionally, their Chairperson has made his share of attacks against us.

In fact, all that is happening is that their record is being exposed and challenged. And when we do this, we always offer specific examples and documents to validate our claims.

Issues such as the Tocco recall, the Municipal Court, Character, the State Courthouse, quality of their appointments, government transparency and many others are valid and the people of Smithfield deserve a chance to hear both sides of these issues. The Democrats, or any other political party, are not going to tell the public what they did wrong and why their agenda is bad for Smithfield. That's the job of the opposition party. This is why we have elections. But voters need to be fully informed so they can make choices.

In the past two years, Smithfield Democrats have created many issues. In our opinion, they have made poor and politically motivated appointments, handled town resources badly, engaged in cronyism, reduced public access to town records, harmed public services and damaged our town's reputation and ability to serve our residents. We have explained why we believe this. That's not negative campaigning, it's just putting the facts out for public consideration.

Town government will have more impact on your quality of life than any other government. Town officials control what happens in your children's schools, how your money is spent, whether your roads are plowed and your trash picked up and, perhaps most important, how effective your public safety services are.

All the issues we raised deserve complete and open responses from our opponents. Instead, they accuse us of bitter partisan and personal attacks. That's because they don't have good answers.

Don't give them a pass. We always present facts and evidence to back up what we say. Demand that they do the same.