When Judge Mike Powell moved to the 12th District Court of Appeals and Judge Don Oda moved from the county court to common pleas, party Chairman David Nichols convened a committee to vet potential judicial candidates. The executive board of the party voted on and confirmed the committee’s recommendations last week.
Mason Councilman Tom Grossmann, who was chairman of the party from 2002-10, said during his tenure as chairman the executive committee of the party made the selections to send to the governor. He added that what Nichols did was completely appropriate.
“This was not done as a matter of some ‘rule’ of the party, but because this is how the governor and the chairman of our party, which was me for 8 years, chose to proceed with the matter,” he said. “Ohio’s governor and the party chairman, now David Nichols, had the right to proceed in a different manner and no rule of the party prohibited this.”
Warren County Prosecutor David Fornshell, who also served as GOP chairman, said the central committee is the body that selects people to fill vacancies in non-judicial elected positions, but the governor has full control over judicial vacancies.
“In a judicial seat, quite frankly it’s completely up to the governor as to exactly what methodology he wants to use for picking judicial replacements,” he said. “There is no legal requirement that the governor seek any type of local input.”
In this instance the governor just asked for three names and Fornshell said Nichols had the right to convene a screening committee and put it up for a vote of the executive committee. The last common pleas vacancy occurred when Democratic governor Ted Strickland was in power. He had lawyers apply directly to a screening committee he had set up. Judge Robert Peeler was selected to replace Judge James Heath, who killed himself in 2009.
Linda Oda, who is secretary of the executive committee, agreed Nichols did nothing improper, but she still does not like the way things transpired. And she said there have been judicial appointments — not in recent times — made when the central committee was the recommending body.
“Did our chairman do anything wrong? Absolutely not, he did nothing wrong,” she said. “Did he do it the way it’s always been done and the way the people who are elected to these positions thought it was going to be done? No. And he’ll suffer the ramifications of that.”
The three names submitted for the juvenile court were Supreme Court Administrative Director Steve Hollon, County Court Judge Joe Kirby and attorney Tim Tepe who was also recommended for the county court bench. Assistant Prosecutor Gary Loxley and attorney Tom Kidd also got the nod for the part-time county court.
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