Your guide to the 2024 Election: Statewide races and local issues

The 2024 election is in less than four weeks, and early voting in Ohio has already begun. This week, the Oxford Free Press is highlighting what’s on the ballot in Butler County, with a focus on statewide races and local issues. Next week, the Free Press will highlight the local candidates running for office.

Ohio Supreme Court

Three seats on the Ohio Supreme Court are on the ballot this year, with a Republican and a Democrat running for each. This is the second Supreme Court election in the state since Ohio passed a law requiring top judicial candidates to indicate their party affiliation. In 2022 — the first election with the new rule in place — Republican candidates held on to all three states up for reelection and maintained the current court balance of four Republicans and three Democrats.

Incumbent Republican Justice Joseph Deters was appointed to the court by Governor Mike DeWine in December 2022 after Sharon Kennedy was elected as chief justice. He began in the position in January 2023. Before that, Deters was Hamilton County’s longest serving prosecutor, holding that position from 1992-1999 and from 2005 until his appointment to the Ohio Supreme Court. Deters was elected as Ohio Treasurer in 1998 and 2002, and he had no prior experience as a judge prior to his appointment.

Rather than running to maintain his current seat and facing another election in 2026, Deters has opted to challenge Democratic incumbent Melody Stewart for her seat instead, leaving his unexpired term open to two new candidates.

Stewart is the first Black woman to serve on the Ohio Supreme Court. The Cleveland native was elected in 2018 after serving on Ohio’s Eighth District Court of Appeals from 2006 until her election to the Ohio Supreme Court. Stewart studied music in college before attending law school and served as a civil defense litigator before becoming a faculty member at the University of Toledo College of Law and an administrator at Case Western Reserve University’s School of Law.

Democrat Lisa Forbes, a judge on Ohio’s Eighth District Court of Appeals since 2020, will run to fill Deters’ seat. She’ll face off against Daniel Hawkins, a judge on the Franklin County Common Pleas Court. Whoever wins the race will have to run again in 2026 due to the unexpired term.

According to Forbes’ campaign site, she is “the first generation to go to college in her family” and has prior experience as a business litigator and partner at a national law firm. Forbes also has experience serving on several boards of directors.

Hawkins was the only Republican elected to the Franklin County Common Pleas Court when he ran in 2018, according to reporting by The Columbus Dispatch. His prior experience includes serving on the Environmental Division of the Franklin County Municipal Court and working for 13 years as a trial prosecutor.

Incumbent Democrat Michael Donnelly, first elected to the Ohio Supreme Court in 2018, will face a challenge from Republican Megan Shanahan this November.

Shanahan currently serves on the Hamilton County Court of Common Pleas. Before that, she was a criminal prosecutor, and her website states that she successfully tried more than 50 jury trials.

Prior to being elected to the Ohio Supreme Court, Donnelly worked as an assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor, and in 2004 he was elected as judge of the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court. Donnelly’s website states that he led the Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities Court, which focuses on cases where defendants have developmental disabilities.

U.S. Senate

Voters across Ohio will choose between Democratic incumbent Sherrod Brown and Republican challenger Bernie Moreno to represent the state in the U.S. Senate. The race is one of the most closely watched nationally: if Moreno wins, Republicans will likely win control of the Senate.

Moreno, a Cleveland businessman and immigrant from Colombia, won the Republican primary against two candidates with political experience after receiving an endorsement from former president Donald Trump. Moreno’s website, www.berniemoreno.com, lists 16 priorities including securing America’s borders, empowering parents to make educational choices, enacting term limits for Congress, defending constitutional rights including the Second Amendment, restoring American manufacturing and to “end wokeness and cancel culture.”

Brown, a U.S. Senator, was first elected to his current seat in 2006 and is the only Democrat serving in a statewide seat for Ohio. He is Chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, which focuses on issues ranging from insurance and banking to mass transit and housing. According to Brown’s website, www.sherrodbrown.com, his primary issues include protecting seniors’ access to Medicare and social security, securing the border, protecting abortion and birth control access, and “fighting for rural Ohioans.”

Ballot Measures

Butler County voters will have a say in one statewide ballot measure and several local and county initiatives this November. Those local initiatives include Oxford’s Issue 2 and College Corner’s Issue 3. Here’s what voters located within College Corner or the Talawanda School District may see on their ballots.

Issue 1: Redistricting Amendment

Ohio group Citizens Not Politicians succeeded in placing a constitutional amendment on the ballot this year which would restructure the state’s redistricting process. The move comes after the Ohio Supreme Court repeatedly struck down maps drawn by lawmakers as unconstitutional in 2022. Then-Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, a Republican, was the deciding vote and is now involved with Citizens Not Politicians.

If approved, the new amendment would establish a 15-person citizen commission in charge of drawing legislative maps for Ohio. The commission would be made up of five Democrats, five Republicans and five Independents, and the legislative maps would need to closely align with Ohioans’ statewide party preferences.

For more information on Issue 1, read the explainer by Journal-News reporter Avery Kreemer on the Journal-News website or in the Oct. 11 print edition of the Oxford Free Press.

Issue 2: Oxford Fire and EMS Levy

Residents of the City of Oxford only will decide whether to pass a 2.6-mill levy to increase funding to the Oxford Fire Department (OFD). If passed, the department will receive an additional $1.283 million in property tax revenue each year, plus $1.27 million per year from Miami University, contingent on the Fire and EMS levy’s passage. The city estimates that OFD will face a deficit of $24 million over the next 10 years if the levy does not pass.

The Butler County Auditor website reports that the levy would lead to an increase of $91 in property taxes per $100,000 in property value each year.

The League of Women Voters of Oxford is holding a discussion on the levy at 7 p.m. Oct. 16 in the Knolls of Oxford Auditorium. City Manager Doug Elliott will attend to answer questions and provide details.

The Free Press has published a breakdown of Issue 2 for voters online. OFD Chief John Detherage has said that the high call volume and long hours has made it difficult for the department to retain full-time staff. At any given time, just five employees are on duty. Detherage previously told the Free Press that if the department has to respond to two emergencies at once, it can’t send a fire engine to either because it needs to prioritize sending an ambulance to each.

If the levy passes, much of the funding would go toward hiring additional staff and replacing capital equipment. If it fails, Elliott said the city will reduce staffing in other city departments and make other cuts to capital improvement and equipment purchases city-wide.

Oxford maintains a list of frequent questions regarding the levy on its website at www.cityofoxford.org.

Issue 3: College Corner Police Levy

Residents of the Village of College Corner only will vote on whether to renew a 5-year, 7-mill police levy. Last time the police levy appeared on the ballot, it passed with 77.8% of the vote in Butler County.

College Corner straddles Butler and Preble Counties. For College Corner residents living in Preble County, the levy will show up as Issue 9.

The police levy was first passed in 2010 and generates $30,000 per year. That money goes toward College Corner’s contract with the Butler County Sheriff’s Office, which stations a deputy in the village.

The levy costs $151.21 per $100,000 in property value, according to the Butler County Auditor. Voting yes this year would not increase property owners' taxes.

Issue 10: Lane Public Library Levy

Voters across western Butler County will decide whether to renew Lane Public Library’s 0.75-mill levy indefinitely this November. The library levy was first introduced in 2010 and helps Lane Libraries offset operational costs. Libraries in Ohio are partially funded by the state’s Public Library Fund.

The Lane Library system operates in Hamilton, Fairfield and Oxford. Voters in the Talawanda School District as well as Hamilton City Schools, Fairfield City Schools, New Miami Local Schools, Ross Local Schools and parts of the Edgewood City School District will see Issue 10 on their ballots.

According to an informational sheet from Lane Library, the organization relies on the levy for 30% of its total funding. Failure to renew it could impact services including programming and outreach.

The Butler County Auditor’s website reports that the renewal would not increase property taxes for residents. The current tax costs $15.33 per $100,000 in property value per year.

Issue 12: Mental Health Levy

Butler County’s Mental Health and Addiction Recovery Services Board (MHARS Board) is asking voters to approve a 0.5-mill levy which would open up a further $6.6 million in funding for mental health services in the county.

Scott Rasmus, executive director of the MHARS Board, said the new levy would replace a 0.5-mill levy first passed in 1985. That levy, which brings in a fixed value each year, only collects $2.3 million per year for the board now. MHARS has an operating budget of $19.8 million for the current fiscal year, which is partially paid for by an additional 1-mill levy which raises $8.3 million per year and initially passed in 2006.

Rasmus said the additional funding would go toward services to help combat suicides and overdoses. The suicide rate has increased in Butler County since the pandemic, Rasmus said, and opioid deaths continue to be common in the county.

“We’ve got a mobile crisis team. We’ve got a hotline. We’ve got prevention services and things,” Rasmus said. “We see a need to sustain those services and then expand to help address and bring those numbers down.”

Other services the MHARS currently helps to provide throughout the county include counseling and treatment services, mental health services for seniors and treatment payment assistance for low-income individuals. Rasmus said those services could all be continued or expanded if the levy is approved this year.

According to the Butler County Auditor’s website, passing the new levy would increase taxes from $4.83 to $17.50 per $100,000 in property value yearly.