Last night's League of Women Voters debate between Stark County Commissioner Todd Bosley (Democrat - Marlboro) and incumbent state Representative Todd Snitchler (Republican - Lake) for Ohio's 50th House District and between state Representative Scott Oelslager (Republican - North Canton) and former Stark County Court of Common Pleas Judge Richard Reinbold ((Democrat - Canton) was a definite improvement over the Secrest/Slesnick debate of a couple weeks ago.
The candidates were better prepared and more articulate than Travis Secrest (R - Canton Township and executive director of the Stark Republican Party) and incumbent 52nd Ohio District state Representative Stephen Slesnick (D - Canton).
Even moderator Dick Kuhn was better put together than he was two weeks ago.
Overall the SCPR rates Representative Snitchler as the best prepared to answer questions and had a specific agenda he wishes to achieve if re-elected.
Todd Bosley gets ranked number two. Snitchler had an advantage over Bosley in that he has been in the Legislature for two years. And he worked the advantage in his favor.
But Bosley did challenge him effectively on issues such as whether or not it is the responsibility of the Ohio General Assembly to create jobs. However, Bosley was vague on having a specific agenda.
The most surprising candidate at Wednesday night's debate was Dick Reinbold. As readers of the SCPR know, The Report has tabbed Reinbold (in previous blogs) as being Stark County's most boring candidate. Well, last night Reinbold exploded that notion and, accordingly, The Report has to take that evaluation back. In fact, The Report rates Reinbold #3 in terms of quality of presentation and response, however, he was only slightly behind Bosley.
Reinbold was interesting last night and put long-time legislator W. Scott Oelslager on his heels from the get-go with his opening statement charge that Oelslager is a career legislator contrary to the fact that Ohio has term limits. Moreover, Reinbold forced Oelslager (who has been in the Legislature since 1985) to defend his inability to get anything done on reforming school funding which the Ohio Supreme Court has said four times (the first decision being in 1997) that Ohio's funding is unconstitutional.
Oelslager is a prime example of a public official who as grown fat on the public payroll and demonstrates a "fat, dumb, and happy" demeanor about himself. The Report doesn't think Oelslager is dumb, but he certainly is a fixture type of public official who glad hands galore and shows that he has a staff that has perfected a public relations skill to make Oelslager look like he is being effective for Stark County. But the reality is that he is not.
Oelslager clearly projected a "I'd really rather not be here" attitude and, indeed, couldn't hit the exit door faster than he actually did at the debate's conclusion.
For this Oelslager deserves the SCPR #4 ranking of all the candidates who presented and responded to the questions asked.
In today's blog, the Report presents a video of Snitchler and Bosley answering a question on their top priority in making a policy change to bring more jobs to Stark County and Ohio.
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