The Portage County Board of Elections has dismissed the sheriff’s office from providing election security at the board office in response to the sheriff’s recent politically charged Facebook comments. Instead, security will be provided by Ravenna police.
In the past, the Portage County Sheriff’s Office had provided security during regular business hours at no cost, Board of Elections Deputy Director Theresa Nielsen said. But on Friday, in a 3-1 vote, the board authorized Director Faith Lyon and Nielsen to request services from the Ravenna police during early in-person voting and after-hours polls worker training.
The Board of Elections is composed of four people: two Democrats and two Republicans. Board member Randi Clites, a Democrat who initiated the change, said her proposal was wholly based on voters’ feedback stating they felt intimidated by Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski’s recent Facebook posts.
The posts encouraged his supporters to record the names and addresses of people with Kamala Harris signs in their yards so that if undocumented immigrants arrive in Portage County, they can live with the people who voted for her. He referred to immigrants as “locusts” and called Harris a “hyena.”
“As board members we are charged with preventing violence and disorder at the polls, and to conduct a safe and secure election process,” Clites told her colleagues. “It is clear by public comments in the past week there is perceived intimidation by our sheriff against certain voters.”
Clites said she is not responsible for weighing in on the sheriff’s comments, but must “make sure that every voter in Portage County feels safe casting their ballot for any candidate they choose. I believe walking into a voting location where a sheriff deputy can be seen may discourage voters from entering.”
Thanking the sheriff’s office for its past services, Clites said she did not believe “for one second” that any deputy would not continue to provide proper service.
“However, not every citizen or voter has had that same opportunity to build the level of trust with our deputies,” she concluded.
Denise Smith, chair of the Portage County Democratic Party and the board’s other Democratic member, said she agreed wholeheartedly with Clites.
“In any election where the sitting sheriff is on the ballot, security should be provided by the City of Ravenna or through a private security contract. This is especially true when that law enforcement officer makes a public statement of his bias,” she said.
Zuchowski “crossed the line, and the BOE needed to make sure that voting — during early voting especially — was accessible and free of any barriers or perceived intimidation,” Smith said.
Republican Amanda Suffecool, who chairs the Portage County Republican Party, cast the only vote in favor of retaining the sheriff’s office’s services. Citing fiscal responsibility as her motivation, she said she could not in good conscience dismiss the deputies without knowing who would take over security or how much it would cost.
After the sheriff posted his remarks on Facebook, Suffecool issued a statement supporting his right to free speech.
“I believe the sheriff’s statement is a bit of artistic license getting toward the principal belief that elections have consequences,” she wrote, invoking Springfield, Ohio as an “example of what can happen in each and every community when and if they are overrun with people who do not understand our laws, nor share our customs.”
Asked to explain what Springfield has to do with Portage County, Suffecool said, “It’s very clear what those two things have to do with one another.”
Doria Daniels, the board’s other Republican board member, voted to remove the sheriff’s office. In a letter to the editor of The Portager, speaking for herself and not the board, she urged everyone to “tone down the rhetoric.”
“There are times when we have to use wisdom when our individual First Amendment right to free speech comes into conflict with our public duty as an elected official,” she wrote in the letter.
It is never appropriate for such a person “to be encouraging friends to retaliate, bully or harass a voter exercising their rights of political expression, even if we disagree with them,” she added.
Asked to expand on her thoughts, Daniels responded with three words: “Election integrity matters.”
The sheriff’s office has provided security during regular business hours at no cost, but did charge for services for evening and weekend poll worker training sessions.
Ravenna Police Chief Jeff Wallis said his department will provide the board’s security needs.
“We were able to fill those hours. There’s a little bit of overtime, but I talked with the mayor and he said it was fine,” Wallis said.
Wendy DiAlesandro is a former Record Publishing Co. reporter and contributing writer for The Portager.