Stark County came within 552 votes (unofficial vote tally) of getting a non-political prosecutor in office yesterday.
It will be interesting to comb through precinct results and determine where Republican Jeff Jakmides of Alliance came up short.
With Stark having 288 precincts, he needed two more votes on average per precinct to come out a winner.
While Jakmides individually lost, the bigger loser was the Stark County public.
Stark County is not dealing effectively with crime as indicated on crime statistics on Canton, the Stark's county seat, to wit:
THE PROSECUTOR RACE
The Stark County Political Report believes that Prosecutor John Ferrero is more focused on the politics of retaining office than he is on effective and lasting (in the sense of being sparing on plea bargaining) prosecution of criminals "as charged" and thereby keep criminals out of our neighborhoods for longer period of time.
When you couple Ferrero and his "quick to plea bargain" approach to plea bargaining with Sheriff George T. Maier who the SCPR thinks has made his office a haven of appointees whose first duty appears to be personal political loyalty and effective law enforcement a secondary priority, Stark Countians ought to be feeling less secure in their persons today than yesterday.
Maier too was on the ballot yesterday as an unopposed candidate.
In the 2014 elections, Stark Countians blew it in electing Maier over his Republican opponent Larry Dordea currently the police chief in Hartville and formerly the chief in Alliance.
In Alliance, Dordea is credited with having cleaned up a illegal drug problem.
And, Dordea tells the SCPR he was committed to doing the same for all of Stark County.
Maier makes a big show about cleaning up a current epidemic level heroin supply/use and overdose problem, but the problem continues to grow.
A Jakmides/Dordea law enforcement team would have made Canton and all of Stark County as much more crime free/illegal drug free community.
Elections do matter and The Report thinks that we Stark Countians are about to experience lax prosecution and law enforcement at an unprecedented level with Ferrero and Maier in place.
OTHER RACES
SMITH/SLESNICK - STARK COUNTY COMMISSIONER
Stark County did avoid another election results disaster yesterday in Canton Township trustee Bill Smith's resounding victory over Democrat Stephen Slesnick.
Slesnick, in the opinion of the SCPR, was a do-nothing state representative for eight years which likely had he been elected Stark County commissioner yesterday.
Hopefully, Canton/Stark County has seen the last of Slesnick as a candidate for elective office.
SHRIVER/GIAVASIS - CLERK OF COMMON PLEAS COURT
Plain Township's Claude Shriver in lambasting former Plain Township trustee Louis G. Giavasis (who is the brother of Stark Co. Dems chair Phil Giavasis) for political cronyism apparently was on to something that resonated with a number of Stark County voters.
Giavasis bears watching very closely in his administration of the clerk of courts office in terms of his employment practices.
ARNOLD/CAMPBELL - RECORDER
Democrat Rick Campbell is another countywide official who the SCPR thinks is way too political in how/who (i.e. the politically connected) he has hired into his office. And besides that, there are those who think he is pretty much an absentee recorder.
Republican John Arnold (a Lake Township trustee) gave Campbell a big time "wake-up" call in yesterday's election.
Campbell could be ripe for the political plucking in the 2020 elections.
CAIN/ZUMBAR - TREASURER
Of all of yesterday's candidates, the most qualitative was Republican Stark County treasurer Alex Zumbar.
In the past, Zumbar has had some relatively close races notwithstanding the excellent job he has done in restoring public confidence in the treasurer's office post-theft-of-upwards of $3 million by former Chief Deputy Vince Frustaci (found out in April, 2009).
His 24% victory over Lake Board of Education member (former president of the state board of education under Democratic governor Ted Strickland) Debbie Cain is well deserved.
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