Republicans elect Mike Witte, re-elect Patty Stein to state Central Committee

Republican voters in state Senate District 13 elected Mike Witte their new state Central Committeeman on Tuesday, replacing Lorain County GOP Chairman David Arredondo on the state party's top committee. Witte received 5,453 votes to win the contest. Arredondo, who was appointed to the position in September following the resignation of Bob Meilander, came in second with 4,041 votes. Peter Aldrich was third with 2,166 votes, according to incomplete and unofficial results from the Ohio secretary of state's Office. In the Republican state central committeewoman's race, the two candidates were neck and neck in vote tallies. Incumbent Committeewoman Patty Stein held a narrow lead of 5,553 votes to Jean Anderson's 5,482, according to incomplete and unofficial results from the secretary of state's office. As it stood Tuesday, Stein's 71-vote lead is out of recount range, but that could change once provisional ballots are counted. Vote totals need to be within one-half of 1 percent to trigger an automatic recount. Democratic state Central Committee candidates Dan Ramos and Ann Tanner were unopposed. The central committees of both the Democratic and Republican parties have 66 members each: One man and one woman for each of 33 state Senate districts. In the case of the Ohio GOP, those who are elected to the volunteer position meet quarterly in Columbus, and sometimes more frequently on the subcommittee level, to decide which candidates to endorse and select their party's chairperson when necessary. Witte, an architect, third-generation owner of Bert R. Witte Inc. in Amherst and a former candidate for Amherst Board of Education, thanked everyone who supported and voted for him. He previously ran for state central committeeman in 2014 and 2016, he said. His primary goal this time is to "try to make it more fair for people to run in the primary." The party "seems pretty intent on supporting the incumbent as opposed to challengers," Witte said. He pointed at what he called the "astounding amount of effort put forth" to defeat state Board of Education member Kirsten Hill, who unsuccessfully challenged incumbent Republican state Sen. Nathan Manning of North Ridgeville for the GOP nomination in the 13th Senate District on Tuesday. It "seemed like an awful lot of effort spent to put down a challenger," Witte said. "The endorsement process puts the weight of the party in favor of the endorsed person, which is almost always the incumbent." The party shouldn't keep "recycling the same career politicians," he said. In a statement he sent to The Chronicle-Telegram on Wednesday, Arredondo thanked the "thousands of voters who supported my candidacy for the Republican State Central Committee." He wrote that he regrets "I did not do enough to ensure a win for them and me." Arredondo called for party unity statewide and nationwide "to ensure a win in November." "It is entirely possible that our entire ticket consisting of 21 candidates will win," he said, saying the Ohio Supreme Court races on the ballot are of "utmost importance." He also congratulated the other Republican candidates who won their primary races, including Witte, and said he was "very pleased" with Republican turnout on Tuesday. "I know that some Democrats switched and some Independents voted Republican. Before this primary, there were only 907 more D's than R's. My hope is that we closed this gap yesterday," Arredondo said. "My principal mission as chairman of the Lorain County Republican Party is to recruit, support and elect Republicans to office and I will do my best to continue doing so. Thank you for your support for me and our Republican Party." Aldrich also thanked his supporters. He also expressed regret that he hadn't put the amount of effort he wanted into the race, having taken a new job just after throwing his name in. Aldrich said he was "kind of disappointed" at the structure of the race. He said he never was contacted by state party officials to answer questions about his candidacy so they could make an endorsement decision. "I'm a little perplexed how somebody can endorse in a race when they don't talk to everyone," he said. Aldrich said the state party hasn't been audited in years and needs to be more transparent about the decisions he said are currently made behind closed doors. "They had their hand-picked candidates," he said, "when they never even interviewed me or sent questionnaires." Stein thanked the voters for returning her to the state Central Committee for a third term. "I appreciate the support they gave for me and look forward to listening to them in the future and following what they would like me to do," she said Wednesday. A message seeking comment was left for Anderson. Contact Dave O'Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com. Follow him on Twitter @DaveOBrienCT.