IF SHE APPLIES, JENNIFER CREIGHTON KLING (DAUGHTER OF STARK COUNTY COMMISSIONER JANET CREIGHTON) THE FAVORITE TO REPLACE DARYL REVOLDT AS COUNCILPERSON - AT - LARGE?

The Stark County Political Report has confirmed that Jennifer Creighton Kling, daughter of Stark County Commissioner Janet Creighton is considering filing a application with North Canton City Council (Council) to replace Daryl Revoldt as councilperson-at-large.

Her hesitation is that she has been predisposed to run for the North Canton Board of Education reportedly has some issues with how things are being run in the North Canton City Schools. In fact, a person close to her is encouraging her to run for the four year term position.

However, the SCPR believes that the outgoing Revoldt and sitting Councilwoman Marcia Kiesling are putting pressure on Kling to apply for Revoldt's vacated (as of 8:00 a.m./March 28th) position.  One of the reasons given by SCPR sources is that the likes of Kiesling and Revoldt (both Stark County Republican Party Executive Committee members) worry that should Kling run for the board of education, she could end up unseating Republican Jordan Greenwald.

One of things that Stark Countians are concerned about is that politics plays too much of a role in selections by the Stark County Democratic and Republican "organized" parties of local government officials.  Neither party pays enough attention to the qualifications that a given person brings to the table.  And, The Report, suspects that Marcia Kiesling is, to name names, is an example of a person who may take politics too far.  For instance, the SCPR believes that she was the primary force in bringing in her fellow Stark GOP Executive Committee member Hans Nilges as North Canton's law director.

Hmm?

Although - without Kling - seven North Cantonians have already applied for the job, The Report believes that only one of the seven is a serious possibility to be selected.  James Repace, former head of IBEW local 1985 whose members (some 2400) staffed the now defunct (as far as North Canton operations is concerned) Hoover Company.

While former Councilman Chuck Osborne is a candidate and nobody knows the nooks and crannies of North Canton politics and government like he does, he has had such a confrontational relationship with Council over the years;  it would be a truly astounding development for the current Council to bring him on board.

Democrat Repace was elected in 2005 but did not run for re-election in 2007 as the Hoover Company was in the throes of being bought up and moved out of North Canton, and Repace had his hands full, as the union head, of dealing with that situation.

Note the names of two of three defeated candidates in the 2005 election:  Marcia Kiesling and Jason Greenwald.

Hmm?

So now Kiesling (who was elected to Council in 2007; re-elected in 2009) has a role in protecting Greenwald in attempting to persuade Kling to go for the Revoldt vacancy rather than run for a board of education slot?

Moreover, perhaps Kiesling,  in being a recruiter of a specific candidate for the appointment, should she apply, ought to recuse herself from voting on the appointment?

In this day and age, in Stark County especially, the kind of "backroom political wheeling and dealing" that it appears Kiesling and Revoldt seem to be engaged in, is not public confidence building in terms of transparency or avoiding the appearance of "conflict-in-interest."

On the latter count the question is:  would Jim Repace get a fair consideration by Marcia Kiesling in light of her prior election defeat to him and other interests she appears to have in this matter? 

It could be that other viable candidates for the Revoldt position will step forward between now and April 1st, the filing deadline.  But do not look for that to happen.

If Kling applies, then the contest will boil down to Kling versus Repace.

Should Kiesling not recuse herself in such a such a setting as the SCPR maintains she should, then advantage to Kling.  The graphic above indicates how The Report believes the vote is set up in a Kling/Repace match up.  In that Snyder, Davies and Mayor Held (who breaks a tie) are Republicans, then it is hard to believe that politics will not rule the day and Kling gets the appointment.

By all accounts Jennifer Creighton Kling is a highly accomplished person who works in the pharmaceutical industry.  But she does not have a background in elective politics.

Nevertheless, it is - to repeat - The Report's belief that a Kling/Repace face-off goes to Jennifer Creighton Kling becoming Daryl Revoldt's replacement on North Canton City Council.

(VIDEO) KAREN ALGER APPOINTMENT AS FINANCE DIRECTOR TO BE MADE OFFICIAL. ALSO, HYDRAULIC FRACKING DISCUSSION "ON, OFF, ON-AGAIN, OFF-AGAIN?"

 

As of this morning, the North Canton City Council (Council) agenda for tonight's meeting does not show that Chesapeake Energy (which interestingly enough,  is based in Oklahoma where yours truly sits writing this blog [visiting my middle daughter who is a Ph.D candidate at Oklahoma University] will presenting to Council.

However, it is not unheard of that agenda's get amended at the beginning of a meeting and therefore the SCPR would not be shocked to learn that was on, then off is back on again.

North Cantonians should stay alert on this matter.

The SCPR has reports that on Friday there was a great deal of jockeying around going on among Council members and the North Canton administration as to whether or not Chesapeake would be appearing.

For a number of months there has been speculation that a couple of property owners in the vicinity of North Canton's East Maple Street water well field have either signed leases or are about to sign leases that would enable Chesapeake do hydraulic fracturing wells to extract natural gas encased in deep shale deposits.

A source tells the SCPR that there have been discussions in Council about buying one or more of the properties in order to have more control over whether or not any drilling takes place.

The Report is told that Council president Daryl Revoldt had scheduled Chesapeake to speak at the meeting tonight but has backed off when is arrangement became public knowledge.

If North Canton gets into a discussion on fracking policy, it will be joining Plain Township (where the properties in question actually are located), Hartville, Alliance and Canton as they are already involved in considering policy initiatives.

The Report has spoken with Revoldt in the recent past about his take on fracking and understands that he is not exactly where other Stark County vigorous opponents of fracking (e.g. Trustee Louis Giavasis of Plain, Councilwoman Mary Cirelli of Canton and Councilman and mayoralty candidate Steve Okey of Alliance) would like him to be.  

Revoldt appears to the SCPR to be a "reasonable risk" guy on the issue.  The Report's take on Giavasis, Cirelli and Okey is that they think any risk to drinking water supplies is per se unreasonable and that they believe that there is - a minimum - a risk and therefore they oppose the fracking process.

While the North Canton adjacent properties are near a North Canton well water field, it could be that if Chesapeake can convince Revoldt (who is super influential with a majority of members on Council) that any risk of a problem in drilling poses no risk to polluting the well water, then maybe the oil and gas driller can convince North Canton not to pass legislation prohibiting fracking on the nearby property or, for that matter, on any property in North Canton.  It is unclear how any North Canton ban or limitation on fracking within certain distances of its water fields would affect the properties in questions since they are actually located in Plain Township.  However, Plain Township itself is considering legislation to ban/limit fracking.

It will be very interesting to see how this matter unfolds in North Canton as well as Alliance, Canton and Hartville.

A number of years ago, North Canton experienced a contamination problem with its East Maple Street water facility (unrelated to oil and gas drilling) and therefore has go to be especially sensitive to the fracking question.

On another matter, last week the SCPR reported that Canton finance director Karen Alger (who one worked for Janet Creighton when she was Stark County auditor) has been selected to by North Canton to replace Alex Zumbar as North Canton's finance director.  The Report has included a video in this blog which shows North Canton Councilman Jon Snyder confirming that Alger will be the appointee tonight.

Here is the Snyder video.