Why This Should Matter to Everyone: The Case for a Public Integrity Officer

In my last post, I explained how the Montgomery County Board of Elections turned itself into a “Board of (S)elections” by tossing valid petition signatures and ignoring notarized affidavits from voters who swore those signatures were theirs. That wasn’t just about one candidate in Kettering. It was about the sovereignty of voters, the right of ordinary people to put someone on the ballot without needing permission from party bosses.

This is not an isolated problem. The hurdles we place in front of anyone who wants to run for local office are absurd. Deadlines designed to trip people up. Arbitrary rulings about handwriting by staffers with no training. Partisan boards that split on party lines while 71 percent of Ohio’s voters, the independents, get no seat at the table. And when candidates or citizens try to challenge the process, they are told the deadlines are too tight, the process too rigid, and the doors are closed.

We do not make it this hard to run for coroner. Or county engineer. Or Prosecutor. Or Sheriff. Or judge (but we really don’t want to go there in Montgomery County where Judges are in office for life). Offices that require technical expertise are filled by candidates who may have no qualifications other than a certification, the ability to collect signatures and belong to a party. That’s backwards. Those positions should be professional appointments, chosen for merit.

Meanwhile, the one role that actually matters for protecting democracy does not exist. There is no independent watchdog whose job is to hold officials accountable to the public. We have prosecutors, but they answer to political machines. We have inspectors general, but they report up the chain of government. What we don’t have is someone chosen by the people to defend their rights against the system itself.

That’s why Ohio needs a Public Integrity Officer — the People’s Counsel.

The Public Integrity Officer would be directly elected by voters, not by parties. Their duty would be simple: protect the public’s right to fair and open government. That means enforcing sunshine laws and open meetings acts. It means prosecuting officials who break the rules or abuse their office. It means stepping in when boards of elections twist procedure to erase voters’ choices. And it means reporting directly to the people, in plain language, about what’s being done in their name.

If such an office existed today, Nevin Smith’s notarized affidavits would not have been ignored. The voters who signed them would not have been disenfranchised. And the public would not be left wondering if democracy in Kettering is just a game controlled by four political appointees in Dayton.

I would have had help filing to remove Mike Foley from his position as Clerk of Courts after he’d entered a no-contest plea, was sentenced to an F5 felony- which made him inelligible to hold public office. I would have had someone to investigate the residency of Daj’za Demmings or Adil Baguirov. Or stop the illegal meeting run by Jeff Mims and Mohamed Al-Hamdani (before he was even sworn in on School board). Or the case of Esrati v Board of Elections for their schedules that they call agendas.

This isn’t about Democrats or Republicans. It isn’t even about candidates. It’s about voters. If your signature can be erased by a partisan board, your vote can be too. If notarized affidavits don’t matter, then truth itself doesn’t matter. And if the only people empowered to police these abuses are the same people who benefit from them, we’re not living in a democracy.

Ohioans don’t need to elect another coroner. They don’t need to elect another county engineer. They need to elect someone whose only job is to make sure government is working for them, not against them.

It’s time to stop pretending that party insiders are protecting democracy. They’re not. We need a Public Integrity Officer, the People’s Counsel, to do the job they never will.