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STEUBENVILLE — The three males vying for the 96th District seat in Ohio’s Home of Representatives share the identical aim, however it’s the way in which every would obtain it that units them aside.
Democrat Richard Olivito, Libertarian Oscar Herrera and Republican Ron Ferguson are vying for the seat. State Rep. Jack Cera, D-Bellaire, was prohibited from in search of reelection due to time period limits.
The district contains all of Jefferson and Monroe counties and a portion of Belmont County. Home phrases are for 2 years.
∫ Ferguson, 34, is a small enterprise proprietor who’s been energetic politically, although not as a candidate.
He’s labored in a number of capacities — most not too long ago as director of employees coaching — with People for Prosperity, a grassroots group he stated works to spur consciousness and “helps go insurance policies which can be good for the American individuals and good for Ohioans.”
As director of employees coaching, he stated he traveled throughout the nation, visiting 36 states, engaged on issues like bettering well being take care of veterans and legal justice reform — measures that loved main bi-partisan assist.
Legislators “exist to go good insurance policies,” Ferguson stated. “I’ve a great, stable report of serving to go good insurance policies — the identical insurance policies I’ve labored on passing are the identical insurance policies I might have voted for if I have been in workplace. These are the identical sorts of insurance policies you’ll be able to anticipate me to be behind if I’m elected — that’s the one purpose I labored for passage of them, as a result of I believed in them. I imagine they may make this valley a greater place.”
Ferguson stated if he’s elected, “When it’s vital to only rise up for rules and be stable in your foundations, I’m going to battle for what is true.”
He stated job creation and well being care are weighing closely on the citizens in 2020.
Whereas lawmakers don’t create jobs, they do form insurance policies that may spur financial progress. Ferguson stated probably the most vital issues they will do is streamline bureaucratic pink tape.
He additionally insists too many industries across the state are “being backed and propped up” by the residents of the 96th District.
Ferguson, a Jefferson County native and 2008 Ohio State graduate, lives in Wintersville.
∫ Herrera, 24, sees “a common dissatisfaction” with the Republican and Democratic events.
“Individuals aren’t glad with the path these events are headed,” Herrera stated. “As a Libertarian, I’m in neither occasion however I can characterize one of the best a part of the opposite two events — from Republicans, that may be their fiscal response and from Democrats, the social consciousness points of their insurance policies. Doing so, I’m in a position to attain out to voters throughout all spectrums.”
As a Libertarian candidate, Herrera has “no Republican base and no Democratic base I can lean on for assist.” The important thing, he stated, is to “discover individuals keen to hearken to what I’ve to say and persuade them to vote.”
“There have been solely 20,000 individuals who voted for state consultant out of 80,000 eligible voters within the district,” he identified. “Fairly numerous them didn’t vote, and when you speak to these 60,000 voters I feel you’ll discover they actually aren’t pleased with how Ohio politics goes.”
Herrera stated the 96th District wants insurance policies that encourage entrepreneurs and organizations to spend money on the Ohio Valley. He stated he’d prefer to see tech corporations, even inexperienced vitality and farming.
Herrera stated his largest concern is public apathy.
“Individuals simply preserve voting for a similar sort of individuals in workplace,” he stated. “We appear so tied down into our ‘tribes’ — Republican or Democrat — and there’s no dialog between the 2.
“We must be united for a greater tomorrow. In our small cities, individuals have extra in widespread — a robust sense of group and serving to each other. We might not have the largest metropolis in Ohio, however we have now a robust sense of group and serving to each other and we ought to be working collectively, not towards one another, for the widespread good. It’s form of a naive idealism, however I’d slightly work towards that than accept what we have now.”
Born and raised in San Diego, Herrera moved to Jefferson County about seven years in the past and resides in Wintersville.
∫ Olivito, 61, has been consulting on oil and fuel points for the previous eight years. He practiced regulation for 17 years earlier than that with a background in labor regulation, plus had a three-year stint within the Ohio Division of Labor as in-house counsel for the wage and hour divisions.
“I’ve the data and an understanding of presidency,” he stated. “I’ve the expertise, plain and easy, of coping with the state Legislature. I didn’t simply foyer for legal guidelines, I actually wrote three legal guidelines, (together with) the state of Ohio’s first minimal wage regulation in 1988.”
He additionally wrote the proposal for Ohio’s teen curfew, “and put it earlier than the labor committee and testified in regards to the want. It took constructing coalitions to get it enacted.”
He stated his work on minimal wage and prevailing wages “introduced us in touch with small to massive firms. It’s an actual schooling to know not simply labor legal guidelines, however the significance of labor legal guidelines and prevailing wages.”
He concedes his authorized standing is at present not in good standing, however he stated he’s engaged on getting it reinstated. He stated the disciplinary motion stemmed from a chapter case greater than a decade in the past when a clerk observed his shopper had did not check in one in every of 5 locations the place a signature is required and steered he signal within the shopper’s place, so he did, mentioning the doc was handed by the chapter choose.
Olivito stated the largest problem going through the 96th District is jobs.
He stated the COVID pandemic has been a significant concern throughout the district, mentioning public well being insurance policies and front-line employees have carried out a great job.
Small companies are reeling, nonetheless, and he stated the state must make it simpler for employees to assert their unemployment as a consequence of COVID.
Olivito graduated with honors from Oral Roberts College in 1981, majoring in historical past and worldwide relations, then enrolled at Ohio Northern College Regulation Faculty, incomes his regulation diploma in 1984.
He lives in Steubenville.
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