Former Clark County commissioner Rick Lohnes was appointed acting commissioner on Jan. 2 after Melanie Flax Wilt stepped down at the end of December, resigning before her term ended.
Commissioners Charles Patterson and President Sasha Rittenhouse named Lohnes as acting commissioner before the Republican Central Committee appointed someone to take the seat until there is an election.
Rittenhouse said when a commissioner resigns before their term is up, the two remaining commissioners appoint a replacement to serve until the central committee appoints their replacement.
The commissioners’ appointment can last up to 45 days, and the committee’s appointment can only be made after the seat has been vacated for five days, Rittenhouse said.
“This year is unique. We have two separate groups who recognize themselves as the Republican Central Committee. To date, we don’t have a solution or a direction from any state-level authority to indicate to us which one is the party who will be appointing the person who will sit as a commissioner,” she said.
Rittenhouse said that both groups will appoint someone but that “doesn’t necessarily mean” that person is automatically the commissioner because there are steps that have to happen.
“We will continue to take this one step at a time, and in the meantime, Commissioner Lohnes is going to do a great job keeping the county on track,” she said.
The Ohio Revised Code says acting commissioner Lohnes will serve until another candidate “is qualified and takes the office,” said Beau Thompson, chief legal counsel to the Board of County Commissioners. He said Ohio law requires several additional steps before a selected candidate can become county commissioner.
State law says a county officer can’t do any duties until receiving a commission from the governor, and the candidate must take the oath of office and file the required bond, Thompson said.
“Until they receive their commission from the governor, complete their oath before an authorized official, and file their bond with the county treasurer, we will continue with acting county commissioner Rick Lohnes,” he said
Sanders is a lifelong Clark County resident, has five children, worked at Honda for 34 years and now is a bus driver for the Northeastern Local School District.
“I’m glad to see we got people wanting to step up and do this,” he said. “We really need to do a better job and I really think we need to ... have more dirty hands and fewer dirty minds in leadership.”
Cotter is a trustee in Moorefield Twp., where he was born and raised, and is the CFO for the Turner Foundation and director at New Carlisle Federal Savings Bank.
“I was asked to consider being a county commissioner, so who did I go to first other than the Lord, my wife ... we prayed about it and I really do feel led,” he said. “I just want to help the community ... There’s a lot of stuff to be done.”
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