Meet the new bosses, same as the old bosses?

Last November, Cuyahoga County voted to replace our current three County Commissioners and the elected posts of Auditor, Engineer, Treasurer, Coroner, Recorder, Sheriff, and Clerk of Courts by passing County Issue 6.

This means there'll be a new sheriff in town come this fall, in the form of the Cuyahoga County Executive and an 11 person County Council.

Emerging from the wreckage of our current county government is an office that could be the most powerful political position in the region: The County Executive.

Our first County Executive will be elected for a four year term on November 2, 2010, following a primary on September 7. The primary election will determine the Democratic, Republican and Green party candidates for this post, Independent candidates are not required to take part in the primary election. This position will have a salary $175,000 per year.

Working alongside the County Executive will be an 11 person County Council. Each council person will represent a county district. Two districts of particular interest to our area are District 10 which comprises Cleveland wards 10 and 11, East Cleveland, Cleveland Heights, and Bratenahl; and District 11, which consists of Beachwood, Euclid, Lyndhurst, Richmond Heights, South Euclid, and University Heights. County Council positions will have a salary of $45,000 per year.

County Council elections will be similar to the County Executive process, a primary in September followed by the November general election. County Council terms will be 4 years, but to set up a staggered system the first terms for districts 2,4,6,8,and 10 will be for two years. This will result in approx. half the council being up for election every 2 years.

What will they do ??

The County Executive will be the architect of this new government, working with the County Council. The Executive will appoint these new county officers, who will then be subject to confirmation by the County Council: Fiscal officer, Medical Examiner, Clerk of Courts, Director of Public Works, Director of Law, County Treasurer, and Sheriff.

Along with those appointments, which replace the direct election of similar  positions in our expiring form of county government, the Executive will also appoint the directors and officers to county boards, commissions and agencies. Some of these positions are: Director of Health and Human Services, Director of Economic Development, Human Resource Commission. All of these positions are subject to the approval of the County Council.

In addition to this important building of the new county government, the County Executive will also: advocate for the interests of Cuyahoga County, approve or veto county ordinances, serve on the county budget commission, submit annual operating and capital improvement  budgets to the County Council.

There appears to be a lot of power and responsibility vested in this County Executive position. Hopefully, we will be able to elect a person that is capable enough to excel in this new, vital role.

The new government will include an internal auditing department - charged with the responsibility of overseeing internal and external audits. This could help prevent the type of shenanigans we are witness to in the current county crisis.

The goal of county government, according to our new County Charter, is to significantly improve our county's economic competitiveness, to have effective and accountable leadership, the creation and retention of jobs, collaboration with Cleveland and other surrounding communities, improved focus equity for all of our citizens, and to have significant taxpayer savings by streamlining and eliminating unnecessary elected offices.

Ideally, our new County Executive's and County Council's mission will be to fulfill these goals, for the betterment of us all.

Each issue between now and the election, The Collinwood Observer will attempt to shed as much light as possible on the candidates who will be representing our shiny new district, and on the individuals vying for the top seat.

Please send in questions that you would like us to pose to our County Executive and County Council candidates.

You can email betsy@collinwoodobserver.com,  mail them to The Collinwood Observer at 650 E. 185th, 44119, or submit them to our new Observation Deck (www.collingwoodobserver.com, third menu item on left!) under the topic, "What questions would you like our County Executive and County Council candidates to answer. The more you think about it, and share your concerns, the more capable we will all be of making good decisions. Thank you. --Collinwood Observer

List of Candidates

County Executive

Democrat

James Brown

Ed Fitzgerald

Terri Hamilton Brown

Dianna Hill

Georgine Welo

Republican

Paul Casey

Matt Dolan

Victor Voinovich

Green Party

David Ellison

Independent

Ken Lanci

Tim McCormack

Robert Saffold

Don Scipione

County Council - District 10

 Democrat

Sharon Cole

John Crist

K.C. Petraitis

Alan Rapoport

Julian Rogers

Barbara Thomas

Danny Williams

Republican

Robert Brakey

Alan Oberst

County Council - District 11

Democrat

 Rose Allan

Phillip Fine

Daniel Flowers

Jim Joyner

Patrick McLaughlin 

Nino Prodan

Phil Robinson

Sunny Simon

Republican

Kathryn Gambetese

Joe Liptow

Raymond Schmidlin jr

Gregory Smith