Hopeful in Council contest planning write-in campaign

By Robert Mihalek

The Greene County Board of Elections has invalidated the petition of one Village Council candidate.

The board determined that the petition of Carmen Brown did not have a sufficient number of valid signatures, said Tracy Smith, the director of the Board of Elections.

Without enough valid signatures, Brown will not be listed as a candidate for Council on the Nov. 8 ballot. Brown collected 40 signatures, 8 of which were invalid, Smith said. Candidates running for Council needed to collect 35 signatures of Yellow Springs voters to get their names listed on the ballot.

However, Brown said on Monday that she still intends to run — as a write-in candidate. Write-in candidates have until Sept. 19 to file with the Board of Elections, Smith said.

Brown said she was not as disappointed as she thought she would be when she learned that her petition was not valid. “Once you decide to be an active community member, to influence [the community] positively, it doesn’t matter if you’re a member of Village Council or not,” she said.

She said that while not being listed on the ballot will make it more difficult to get elected, she is confident in her ability to win the election.

The ballot will list by name seven candidates seeking three available seats on Council: current Council member Bruce Rickenbach and challengers John Blakelock, Kathryn Chase, Frank Doden, Judith Hempfling, Kathryn Van der Heiden and Karen Wintrow. The Board of Election certified the seven candidates’ petitions, Smith said.

The two candidates in the Council contest with the most votes will receive four-year terms, and the candidate who receives the third highest number of votes earns a two-year term. The top three finishers in the Council race will join Mary J. Alexander and Jocelyn Hardman on Council. The other Council members whose terms expire this November, Tony Arnett, the Council president, and Denise Swinger, are not seeking re-election.

In addition, Smith said, the Board of Elections certified the petitions of those candidates seeking seats on the Yellow Springs school board and the Miami Township Board of Trustees and the office of Yellow Springs mayor.

Incumbent school board member Angela Wright will face Anne Erickson, Aida Merhemic, David Triplett and Terry Whorton. Three seats are available on the board this fall. The winners of the school board race will receive four-year terms. They will join current school board members Rich Bullock and Richard Lapedes.

Mary Campbell-Zopf and Bill Firestone, the other school board members whose terms expire at the end of the year, are not seeking re-election.

Five candidates are seeking two seats on the Miami Township Board of Trustees: Lamar Spracklen, the board president, and trustee Mark Crockett will be challenged by David Heckler, Suzanne Patterson and John Struewing.

The winners of the Board of Trustees race will receive four-year terms, and will join trustee Chris Mucher on the board.

Mayor David Foubert is unopposed in his bid for an eighth term in office.