by Laura Johnston, The Plain Dealer
CLEVELAND, Ohio — Lakewood Mayor Ed FitzGerald won the Democratic Party’s endorsement Saturday for the inaugural Cuyahoga County executive position.
FitzGerald got the nod in a squeaker of a vote and over the objection of opponents who wanted party members to decide on their favored candidate at the September primary.
FitzGerald opposed the county charter last year that created the executive post, yet he was the first entry into the derby for the $175,000-a-year job.
The 41-year-old former FBI agent built the most support among executive committee members of the county’s Democratic Party.
Saturday’s meeting of 369 committee members at the Crowne Plaza Hotel downtown occurred five days before the filing deadline for the Sept. 7 primary election.
Citing the timing and voters’ desire for reform, candidates South Euclid Mayor Georgine Welo and former Opportunity Corridor project chief Terri Hamilton Brown, along with U.S. Rep. Marcia Fudge, urged those at the meeting not to endorse. A fourth Democratic candidate, bus driver James Brown, did not attend.
East Cleveland Mayor Gary Norton said the party would lose power if it didn’t choose one candidate to back.
“Stand up,” he said to the crowd. “Stand and deliver. Do what you were elected to do and lead.”
FitzGerald needed 224 votes of those in attendance, to get the endorsement. He got 227.
“Joe Kennedy once said a landslide is just a wasted effort,” FitzGerald said afterward. “Whether you were with me or not with me, we gotta be together in November.”
Party Chairman Stuart Garson, who last week replaced colorful, controversial county Commissioner Jimmy Dimora as the Democrats’ leader, was pleased with the meeting’s order.
“I wanted everyone to walk out of here with a sense of inherent fairness,” he said, “that everybody had an opportunity to be heard and all points of view were expressed.”
Welo and Brown said they would persevere until the Democratic primary.
“I’m disappointed,” Brown said. “The party is continuing business as usual.”
Welo said, “I think the people of Cuyahoga County have spoken. They wanted a primary. They wanted change.”
The winner of Democratic primary will face the survivor of the Republican primary, in which former State Rep. Matt Dolan and real estate broker Victor Voinovich Sr. plan to compete. Also likely to be in the November general election for the county executive post are former county commissioner Tim McCormack, businessman Ken Lanci and Green Party candidate David Ellison, an architect.
Story Compliments Of The Plain Dealer
