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Trumbull Democrats to vote in public for commissioner replacement
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Dan Polivka, Trumbull County Democratic Party chairman, said he has agreed to use a public form of voting at this Saturday’s meeting of the party’s Central Committee to select an interim replacement for Trumbull County Commissioner Paul Heltzel.
Polivka, also a county commissioner, said an attorney general’s opinion apparently requires a public vote, but not a voice vote or show of hands.
Polivka said hours’ worth of meetings with local and state party officials and legal advisers resulted in a decision to vote privately in a polling booth but to record the votes so that each voter’s choice is available for later review. In the past, voters’ choices were confidential.
Polivka said last week he would need the Trumbull County Democratic Party’s parliamentarian, Trumbull County Assistant Prosecutor Chris Becker, to show him where in Ohio law it says that county political party votes to fill unexpired terms must be taken in public.
On Monday, Polivka said he met with Becker and other party officials and lawyers for four hours over the weekend and has accepted that a 2011 Ohio attorney general’s opinion requires that such votes should be public in order to satisfy requirements for a public meeting.
He said, however, that an opinion is different from an Ohio law, and therefore it is “subject to challenge” in court.
Polivka and others also had a 90-minute conference call with Bill DeMora, Ohio Democratic Party secretary and director of county operations, over the weekend, and they arrived at a solution that is “a little bit better” than what DeMora and another state party official told him last week, Polivka said.
DeMora agreed that Trumbull County precinct committee members do not need to cast a “stand-up vote” in front of the people at the meeting, Polivka said. There are about 170 Trumbull County Democratic Central Committee members, who are elected during the primary by Democratic voters from their precinct every four years.
Last week, Polivka said private voting is best because it prevents retribution by party leaders against precinct committee members who vote against the wishes of party leadership.
But the Democratic National Committee and the Ohio Democratic Party forbid private voting by county central committee members, said Chris Redfern, Ohio Democratic Party chairman.
DeMora offered Polivka the bylaws of a few other county parties to use as guides for rewriting the Trumbull County Democratic Party’s bylaws, but Polivka said he isn’t sure yet whether the party bylaws will be changed before this weekend’s vote, which will be taken at a public meeting at 10:30 a.m. at DiVieste’s Banquet Hall.
Polivka said he isn’t sure yet who has the right to review the voting done by central committee members.
Polivka said DeMora had threatened to revoke the Trumbull County Democratic Party’s use of the state party’s discount on campaign mail and access to its computer-software system that gives detailed information on voters and volunteers.
Polivka said he spoke with officials at the office of Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, and a previous secretary of state, Jennifer Bruner, a Democrat.
He also spoke with John Blue, first vice chairman of the Trumbull County Republican Party, who advised him that the state and national Republican parties do not dictate whether the local party votes in private or public, he said.
Blue and Randy Law, chairman of the Trumbull County Republican Party, did not return phone calls seeking comment.
The Democrats will fill the unexpired term through the end of 2014, but both parties will nominate someone to appear on the ballot in November to fill the last two years of Heltzel’s term.