His Issue 5 got slammed bigtime. Nearly 64% against; 36% for!
A deeper sign that Stark Countians are highly negative on the sitting Stark County Commissioners can be found in the vote on a proposed electric aggregation program.
Readers will note that the issue (45 in Stark County) got trounced 3 to 2 in Stark, while it won with a comfortable margin in Massillon.
Hmm?
After all, this is a program that would save Ohio Edison customers about 6% on their monthly electric bills.
Only plausible explanation to the SCPR is that Stark Countians are completely turned off by anything the commissioners come up with these days and voters have an opportunity to have a say.
Apparently, the "imposed" 0.50 sales/use tax (December, 2008 by Bosley, Harmon and the now retired Jane Vignos); has done political damage to the commissioners beyond their wildest imaginations.
Other Bosley loses last night?
Fire Chief Richard Peterson's stand-ins Michael Lynch and Lisa Shafer (Nimishillen) won going away for trustee. Peterson has dogged Bosley saying that he has the wrong plan to fix Stark's 9-1-1.
Marlboro voters roundly rejected a Bosley favorite (Bosley lives in Marlboro): Trustee Tim Wise. As trustee, Wise (in concert with fellow trustee Dave Wolf [who did not run for re-election] had taken on Marlboro icon Police Chief Ron Devies over what the SCPR believes was a miscommunication but which got turned into a criminal prosecution.
So does this mean Bosley is toast when it comes for his own re-election bid next November. Is he going to be political "toast" one year from today?
Bosley has told the SCPR that he feels that in a year's time, the voters will have forgotten his association with the imposed tax.
The SCPR's take is this. The rub-off on Bosley will be a function of the numbers. A huge loss like this one will taint Bosley and anyone the Republicans run against him will loom large in 2010.
The 64 to 36 margin will bring more than one Republican out of the woodwork. It is very likely that we will be looking at a contested Republican primary in May, 2010. Walters of Jackson, Peters of Massillon and others will now be taking a close, close look at this race.
There is strong irony to this turn of events.
Bosley came out of the oblivion of Nimishillen Township politics riding on a "let's fix 9-1-1 countywide" platform blaming his Republican opponent Richard Regula for not getting the job done and eked out a 1,700 plus vote victory over the powerful Regula name.
Who was one of Bosley's strongest supporters and who, in fact, persuaded Bosley to embrace the 9-1-1 fix?
Nimishillen Fire Chief Richard Peterson, that's who?
But Bosley was not able to effectuate the Peterson plan. In Peterson's mind, Nimishillen's CenCom at Nimishillen Station #3 was to be the cornerstone of a countywide 9-1-1 "state-of-the-art" emergency dispatch service.
One last important point.
Who was to be the project manager to put the new 9-1-1 together?
You've got it: Nimishillen Fire Chief Rich Peterson.
When Bosley couldn't sell CenCom as the hub of centraiized 9-1-1 and could not persuade fellow Democrat and Stark County Democratic Party power Randy Gonzalez to accept Peterson; the Nimishillen chief turned on Bosley and shall we say: "the rest - on November 4, 2009 - is history."
Over the next 365 days Commissioner Bosley will be into repairing the damage done to his political aspirations.
For the likes of the SCPR, there will be a lot of interesting material to write about as the political melodrama plays out in Todd Bosley's struggle to remain Stark County commissioner post 2010.
The effort to unseat Bosley will be a "knock down - drag out" battle. Whoever takes Bosley on can bank on a bitter, bitter, nasty "take no prisoners" campaign.
Any Republican who takes Bosley on had better thoroughly self-assess and have trusted (in the sense of being totally candid) vet him/her before making the leap.
Stayed tuned, folks; 2010 is going to be a very, very exciting political year in Stark County politics.
4 comments:
I wonder if Mr. Bosley is tall enough to reach the Panic Button, because now is a good time to be pushing it.
I wonder how a little humble pie tasted at the Bosley Homestead this morning.
I also have to mention he isn't very bright to think the voters will have forgotten Issue 5 by next year, Todd discounts the strength of democracy again by saying the voters will forget he was associated with Issue 5, and he underestimates his opponents because they are sure to remind the voters.
And I have to wonder if he even wins in the Democratic primary
Tell me where I can get my Janet Creighton for Commissioner yard sign.
Run, Janet, Run!!
Janet Creighton most definately could "dispatch" (Get It!?) Mr. Bosley
Mr. Olsen,
Did you happen to see the front page of the Repository? It is funny that pictured (barely) in the photo of the celebration at the Fighter Group, is none other than "I don't know how I'll vote" Walters. It is funny how this man went from "I don't know how I'll vote" to attending a "No on issue 5" celebration.
I am glad that the voters got to have a say on the imposed tax. I do think it is lame that the commissioners are allowed to continue collecting the tax until May or June (I have read both) after the voters have voted to repeal it.
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