Members to pick Klein’s replacement

Before the members of Columbus City Council pass the city’s first ordinance of 2018, they will choose a new colleague.

Former Council President Zach Klein no longer sits at the head of the sevenmember body. He’s taken a new chair after being sworn in as city attorney after his election in November.

That leaves the remaining six members, all Democrats, to choose his replacement. The council narrowed the list of 36 people who applied for the position late last year to 13 finalists, inviting them

in for private interviews on Thursday and Friday.

On Monday, the council will have a closed session to discuss the appointment. When it returns to an open session, it will accept nominations from the floor before voting to appoint one of the finalists.

Council President Shannon G. Hardin said last week that he was holding off on making committee appointments until after the new member is selected because he wanted to tailor the appointments to members’ strengths.

Northland Community Council President Emmanuel V. Remy, who is a real estate agent, and parks commissioner Rob Dorans, attorney for the Affiliated Construction Trades Foundation of Ohio, have been the expected front-runners for the seat among City Hall insiders for months.

Dorans has strong union support. Members of local organized labor have peppered council members with endorsements for Dorans to be selected.

Remy has worked on several local campaigns, including the Franklin County Democratic Party’s effort to fight a 2016 ballot issue that would have expanded the council and divided seats into districts. He’s worked with the city attorney’s office on efforts to shut down derelict extended-stay hotels on Morse Road.

Dorans declined to comment. Remy did not return calls.

Jasmine Ayres, who finished fourth in the November election for three council seats, also has received significant support outside City Hall, and she was a surprise addition to the list of finalists. She said she plans to deliver a petition with more than 1,000 signers to the council on Monday.

But Ayres likely is a long shot. She ran against three sitting council members in November, and she is a member of the Yes We Can group that has been pushing changes within the local Democratic party.

“Do I think I have a chance? Yes. But who knows in this political climate what’s going to happen from day to day,” she said. “I’m going to talk (in the interview) about what specific policy things I think we can implement to improve the city and also let them know that I want to work with them. This is not an adversarial relationship.”

Several other finalists have gotten this far before. Stefanie Lynn Coe, an attorney and Southwest Area Commission member, and James Ragland, a self-employed consultant and former council legislative aide, both will interview for a council seat again.

“I think that what I’ve seen on the street and everything that has been happening in the city, I felt convicted,” Ragland said. “I could not sit on the sideline and not be engaged.”

Ragland said that with a different council and different political landscape since he applied for the first time in 2009, he believes he has a chance to win the appointment.

Last year, Coe led a charter review committee that studied the size and format of council and the appointment process. The committee recommended that the council consider appointing members who wouldn’t run in the upcoming election.

Coe said the intention was for the council to evaluate seats on a case-by-case basis, though. If appointed, she said she intends to run for re-election. She said she wants to work on “what impacts the average person on the average city street in Columbus.”

The remaining finalists are: Nancy Day-Achauer, United Methodist Church minister; Michael Dalton, MetroHealth Systems lobbyist; Gregory Lee, Accenture consultant; Glenn Mueller, city of Columbus security manager; Mike Rankin, former Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles deputy registrar; Tiffany White, Progressive Insurance litigation review; Christopher L. Wyche, AT&T director of external affairs; and Joshua Zimmerman, a Jimmy John’s franchise owner.