All five mayoral candidates to debate

AUSTIN (KXAN) - All five candidates will be invited to attend the only broadcast mayoral debate of the election.

The debate is at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Apr. 22, at the LBJ Presidential Library and Museum.

Wednesday's live Austin mayoral debate will proceed with invitations extended to all five registered candidates.

KXAN is hosting the debate in partnership with the LBJ School of Public Affairs Center for Politics and Governance as well as the LBJ School student organization “CLASS.”

Given the time constraints of our live broadcast, only the three leading candidates were originally invited. Each accepted.

Invitations to the debate were based on four very specific parameters: The criteria included endorsements from both civic groups and editorial boards, fundraising statistics and polling data.

In a flurry of last-minute politics today, two of the three campaigns requested that we consider extending the invitations to all candidates.

In the interest of providing you, the voter, with the best information to prepare you at the polls, we will invite the remaining two and proceed with that format.

Both KXAN and the LBJ School are committed to a fair and informative public forum.

You can watch the debate on KXAN or online at KXAN.com. The debate will start immediately following KXAN Austin News at Six tomorrow night.

You can also participate in the debate by suggesting a question for the candidates through our Twitter and Facebook pages. Also, you can give your public comments and send us questions during a livesteam and a live chat online throughout the debate.

We have a special page set up for the debate that you can access here or from our home page .

It includes information about the candidates and a special section for asking a question via email or Twitter.