Letters to the Editor Policy
The Union welcomes letters to the editor and "Kudos" (thank-you letters). The Union's letters column is one of the best-read portions of the paper.

· Letters to the Editor must be 200 words or less. Kudos must be 100 words or less.

· All letters and Kudos must include their author‚s real name and city of residence for publication. A valid phone number, which will not be printed, must also be included with the letter. No letter will be printed without verbal confirmation of authorship. We never publish letters that are anonymous or those submitted with a pen name.

· The Union reserves the right to reject letters for abusive language or unsubstantiated accusations. Letters making statistical or factual claims must include in-text citations of verifiable sources. Letters should not attack specific people. Rather, they should challenge ideas or policy. For instance, instead of stating, "I can't believe what an idiot John Doe is when he says that the sky is blue ...". we encourage letter writers to say, "The sky is green because..".

· Like any great work of art, a letter should be an original ˜ not something that someone else wrote for you to submit. We do not publish form letters.

· Letters authored by Nevada County resident on Nevada County topics are given priority for publication. Shorter letters are likely to be published sooner than longer letters.

· We read every letter we receive, and every letter gets equal consideration. The Union makes every effort to publish all the letters it receives, and letters are usually published within a week of verifying their authorship. Letters are posted to www.theunion.com after they are published in the print edition.

· We publish only one letter per person during a calendar month.

· We reserve the write to edit all letters for length or grammar.

· We will attempt to use writers‚ suggested headlines on letters, although headlines are determined according to available space and topic relevancy.

· The decision to print any submission is completely at the discretion of The Union editor.

* required

First name:
Last name:
Address:
City:
State:
Zip code:
Phone (day):
Phone (eve):
E-mail:
Suggested headline:
Dear Editor type or paste text here: