Election Qualifying Begins Today

Those vying to become or remain Paulding County leaders can qualify for office as early as 9 a.m. today.

Qualifying for local government offices is being held at the . Leaders of both the local Republican and Democratic parties will be on hand to qualify those seeking to run in their respective primaries; candidates wishing to run as a nonpartisan also must qualify at the elections office. Several key documents potential candidates will need to qualify can be found in .

Those seeking state office will qualify with the Secretary of State.

Local offices up for grabs include sheriff, probate court judge, superior court clerk, tax commissioner, county commission chairman, one county commission seat (Post 1), chief magistrate, coroner, surveyor and five school board seats (Districts 1, 3, 4, 6 and at-large).

Paulding voters this year will be responsible for filling six seats in the Georgia General Assembly. Two of those seats are in the State Senate—Districts 30 and 31. Seats in House Districts 17 and 19 also will be up for contesting, while Districts 66 and 67 will be decided with the help of some Paulding voters for the first time this year; reapportionment led to the county gaining those two seats.

Qualifying for any level of elected office will end Friday at noon.

Dallas-Hiram Patch invites candidates to e-mail their campaign announcements, headshots, campaign contact information (phone numbers, email addresses, websites, Facebook pages and/or Twitter handles) and other details to Editor Jon Gargis at jon.gargis@patch.com.

We’ll post each candidate’s qualifying announcement ONCE during the days of qualifying and in the order they are received. Dallas-Hiram Patch may edit submitted announcements in the interest of journalistic fairness and will offer no preferential placement or publish time for any candidate, though every effort will be made to post announcements in a timely fashion.

For our readers, we will offer a wrap-up each day of those who have qualified thus far. For the latest in election updates and other news of Dallas and Hiram, subscribe to our free daily newsletter and/or breaking news alerts, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. We also have that can bring you news, our business listings, weather forecasts and more.