The deadline to submit petitions was 4 p.m. Friday, but the Board of Elections still has to review those petitions to make sure they meet legal requirements.
Jeff Rezabek, director of the Montgomery County Board of Elections said the board is expected to certify petitions when it meets on March 14, determining whether all of the candidates qualify for the May ballot.
Dayton commission candidates must have 500 valid signatures, said Rezabek, who added that he thinks the commission races probably will have a runoff special election in May, given the number of candidates who filed.
If there is a runoff election, the four top vote-getters will proceed to the general election in November.
Joseph, who was first elected nearly two decades ago, is the commission’s longest-serving member, while Shaw is finishing his second term in office.
Joseph, a logistics engineer, and Shaw, the owner of a cleaning business, comfortably won re-election in November 2019.
That year, in the May special election, Duncan was the last-place finisher, which meant she did not make it on the November ballot.
Duncan, who previously worked for the city and Montgomery County, also vied for two open city commission seats in 2021, along with Wortham. Duncan again finished in last place in the special election two years ago, and Wortham received the second-fewest number of votes, and neither moved on to the November general election.
Wortham, a former Dayton police officer who works as a security equity investor and trader, ran for a seat on the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners last year and he was narrowly defeated by incumbent Commissioner Carolyn Rice.
Esrati is a local activist, business owner and blogger who has unsuccessfully run for various political offices, including city commission and the U.S. House seat occupied by Rep. Mike Turner, R-Dayton.
Bedinger, a community advocate, grew up in Dayton, but later moved to New York City and worked as a constituent liaison and community representative for the district team of U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who often is referred as AOC, according to information on his campaign website.
Love is a community activist who has spoken out publicly about a variety of issues, including what she called a lack of health care in northwest Dayton and the process the city used to award its $138 million in federal COVID relief funds.
This could be a consequential election. The five-member commission has had multiple 3-2 split votes recently, with Shaw and Joseph in the majority, along with Mayor Jeffrey Mims Jr.
If one or both of the incumbents were to lose their seats, that could shake up the political power landscape at City Hall.
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