There's less than a month left in the Democratic primary campaign for mayor. If you've been following the race, it may seem like every conceivable issue's been bludgeoned to death. But actually things are just about to heat up, with a blitz of candidate TV ads.

And yes, we have another installment in our own campaign coverage. Suck it up; your city's future is at stake.

For starters, there's the perennial puzzle that is the CitySchool District. Then there are the city's own fiscal constraints, which may get worse. In the next three pages, we give you the three major Dem candidates' answers to questions we asked about those issues --- and about how they'd run City Hall.

You'll find more extended discussions --- and a stronger sense of how the candidates express themselves --- at our website, www.rochester-citynews.com. Click the Election 2005 tab.

Where's Maj?

Most of our campaign coverage is focusing on the three major Democratic candidates for mayor: Bob Duffy, Tim Mains, and Wade Norwood. We covered the fourth candidate, Chris Maj, in our August 3 issue ("Inspiration Hits: the Dems' Long Shot").

Why treat him separately? Two reasons:

1) We asked Maj the same basic questions we asked the other three candidates. Their discussions have been longer and more substantive and deserve more space.

2) Anybody who gets 1000 people to sign a petition can run for mayor; Maj did so. That guarantees him a place on the ballot. It doesn't guarantee him media coverage. Newspaper space is limited. For 34 years, we've been providing extensive coverage of political campaigns. Each year, we select a handful of races and candidates, providing deep coverage there rather than diluting our efforts by covering every candidate.

Maj lacks basic knowledge about how government works. Providing more extensive coverage of him would reduce our coverage of the other candidates. An extended version of our interview with Maj will remain on our website until the election. And you can find his platform at www.rochestermayor.com.