Reality, Politics and Vacancies

Candidates for City Council
Non-Democrats need not apply for two seats
Sunday, January 4, 2009 3:36 AM
By Robert Vitale
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
A phone-book-size stack of resumes and cover letters sits on the desks of Columbus City Council members who will pick two new colleagues on Jan. 12.
Sixty-five people applied to fill the vacancies. Over the next week, the five council members who remain will examine qualifications and read through essays on the big issues facing Columbus. They'll meet with any or all of the candidates before their public debate and vote.
However, their job won't be so hard if they follow council protocol. Although the law says anyone who's older than 18 and lives in Columbus can seek a council seat, tradition and politics narrow the list considerably.
Unwritten Rule No. 1: Only Democrats need apply.
Democrats have held every City Council seat since 2003, and they're not about to give one up willingly. Of the 65 council applicants, 40 are registered as Democrats with the Franklin County Board of Elections or have voted in Democratic primaries dating to 2000.
Only five are Republicans, and the rest have no affiliation because they've skipped voting in partisan primaries.
Franklin County Democratic Chairman William A. Anthony Jr. is officially neutral in the council selection process -- to a point. The party will endorse "whoever they pick, as long as they're a Democrat," he said.
And the way Anthony sees it, being a Democrat takes more than just a voting record. The two new council members must begin campaigns immediately to keep their seats beyond the 2009 elections, and it will take money, name identification and party support to win.
"Normally, you get all that because you have been involved in the party at some level," he said.
Of those 40 Democrats seeking council seats, half have deeper ties to the party, as party workers or leaders, campaign managers or volunteers, aides to Democratic officials, or as candidates or officeholders themselves.
Republicans, gloomy about their chances to win at the ballot box in a city where they're outnumbered 3 1/2 -to-1, hold absolutely no hope of slipping one of their own onto the council through appointment.
"This is where the reality of politics on the ground comes crashing up against the theory of good government," said Doug Preisse, chairman of the Franklin County GOP.
He -- and some Democrats -- predict an appointment for Eileen Y. Paley, a lawyer, former candidate for Franklin County Municipal Court judge and a vice-chairwoman for the county Democrats.
Paley also would fill what insiders say is emerging as another unwritten requirement in this round of council vacancies: Maryellen O'Shaughnessy, who resigned to become Franklin County clerk of courts, was the council's only white woman.
Two members of the Democrats' central committee, which will decide 2009 endorsements after new council members are chosen, have applied as well. Tony Eufinger is a law student at Capital University, and Marco Miller is a retired Columbus firefighter and former union president.
Two applicants already have won party endorsements in the past. Gary L. Baker II is a member of the Columbus school board, elected as a Democrat in 2007. Shawn Dingus lost a 2008 race for a Franklin County Common Pleas judgeship but notes on his resume that he carried 53 percent of the vote inside Columbus.
Communications consultant Michael D. Cole was a deputy campaign manager in 2007 for Mayor Michael B. Coleman and the Democrats' council candidates -- the five who will pick the new council members.
James C. Ragland works as the legislative aide to Councilwoman Charleta B. Tavares. Jo Anne St. Clair, a program manager in the city's neighborhood services division, coordinated campaign efforts in Franklin County when Tavares ran for Ohio secretary of state in 1998.
Tavares said she pays no attention to party affiliation or political work, looking instead for evidence that council applicants have been involved in a broader array of civic affairs.
Instead of selecting applicants for interviews, Tavares invited them all to make a pitch, blocking out time for interviews over 12 hours yesterday and today at City Hall.
One applicant called for that kind of process in his letter to council members.
"It would be naive for me to believe that many decisions aren't influenced by misdirected party affiliation," wrote Jose Cannon, a Northeast Side resident who works as a vice president for Vesdia Corp., a technology company. "I, however, am of the opinion that we need to get past the grandstanding and partisan politics of the past and vote for the best person regardless of party."
County records show Cannon is a registered Democrat who voted in a 2006 Republican primary.