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A Youngstown mayoral candidate has withdrawn from the Democratic primary
YOUNGSTOWN
Youngstown mayoral candidate Teresa A. Johnson, whose eligibility was to be the subject of a Tuesday hearing, has withdrawn from the race.
The city charter requires mayoral candidates to “be an elector and resident of the city for the five years immediately preceding the mayor’s election.”
Johnson, who was running for elected office for the first time, said she moved back to Youngstown in May 2013. She registered to vote in May 2014, according to a Mahoning County Board of Elections document.
The charter requirement “was a stumbling block for me,” she said Friday, the day she withdrew from the Democratic primary. “The charter stands at five years. I think the charter needs to be updated.”
Johnson’s withdrawal leaves two candidates, both Democrats, in the mayoral race: incumbent John A. McNally and Jamael Tito Brown, a former council president who lost the Democratic primary to McNally in 2013 by only 142 votes.
The two are seeking the endorsement today of the county Democratic Party.
May 1, the day before the primary, is the deadline for candidates to file as independents for mayor.
Rather than run for mayor, Johnson, 57, who spent the first 19 years of her life in Youngstown, said she will work to change the charter amendment to remove or at least reduce the time restriction on mayoral candidates. She said several cities in Ohio with residency requirements are typically for up to a year.
The board of elections was to have a hearing at 5 p.m. Tuesday to determine her eligibility.
“I don’t think I would have lost on Tuesday, but I don’t know,” Johnson said. “It felt like my integrity was being challenged.”
Dan Bonacker, a city resident, had filed a protest to Johnson’s eligibility writing in a letter that her candidacy violated the city charter and urged the board “to investigate this matter comprehensively and thoroughly.”
Brown said Bonacker is a friend, but didn’t file the protest on behalf of his campaign. Brown said he first learned of the protest when he read about it in The Vindicator.