New voters boost Franklin County jury pool
More than 42,000 new voters registered in Franklin County ahead of this year’s presidential election.
They did more than help decide the winner of Ohio’s electoral votes.
They made themselves eligible for jury duty.
Franklin County Common Pleas Court typically updates its list of residents who are eligible to be summoned for jury service in the coming year during Thanksgiving week when there is little or no court activity. And the same was true this year.
Under Ohio law, jury commissions in the state’s 88 counties can draw from the list of registered voters or a combined list of registered voters and licensed drivers who reside in the county. Franklin County’s Municipal and Common Pleas courts rely solely on registered voters.
Thanks to those who registered so they could vote in the 2020 presidential election, the list of eligible jurors in Franklin County for 2021, finalized last week, has grown to 735,680 names.
A larger pool of potential jurors won’t change the way Common Pleas Court handles the process of randomly drawing names by computer on a weekly basis, said Susan Bedsole, deputy court director.
“It just means people have less of a chance of being called,” she said.
The court received an updated list of registered voters from the county board of elections. New voters were added to the database of eligible jurors for 2021, while those no longer registered to vote were dropped.
The computer program also flagged those who have served on a Common Pleas jury in the past two years, excusing them from being called again until their two years are up.
For now, however, no jurors are being called by the Common Pleas Court. A surge in COVID-19 cases has prompted the court’s judges to suspend all jury trials until at least Feb. 1.
In county Municipal Court, jurors are being summoned, but are “on call” to come in when absolutely needed rather than reporting to the courthouse because so few jury trials are being conducted during the pandemic.
Whenever Common Pleas jury trials resume next year, the jury commission will use its new database of eligible jurors to randomly draw about 300 names per week to receive summonses. About 120 of those individuals typically report, Administrative Judge Stephen L. Mcintosh said.
Despite the fact that more than half those calls are no-shows, those who report provide enough potential jurors to handle the court’s needs, he said.
What can never be determined in any given year is how many people decided not to register to vote because do
ing so makes them eligible to be called for jury duty.
“Anecdotally, it is a real, legitimate thing we hear all over the state,” said Aaron Ockerman, executive director of the Ohio Association of Election Officials.
The use of registered voters to call jurors has sometimes been an obstacle for League of Women Voters of Ohio volunteers as they seek to recruit new voters.
“It’s not uncommon for us to hear concerns about not wanting to serve jury duty as a reason why people don’t want to register,” said Jen Miller, the organization’s executive director.
“It’s one of the reasons why we encourage counties to pool from both registered voters and licensed drivers,” she said. “That’s how you find the most diverse Ohioans.” jfutty@dispatch.com @johnfutty