Prosecutor reviewing sheriff's request to hire an attorney in radios fight

The Lorain County Prosecutor's Office is reviewing Sheriff Phil Stammitti's request that it find him an attorney in his ongoing fight with the county Board of Commissioners over control of the county's emergency radio communications system, Prosecutor J.D. Tomlinson said Wednesday. "We're dealing with that issue and reviewing that right now," he said, without further comment. Stammitti, a Democrat, said he can't legally hire his own attorney to argue his case. He sent a letter to Tomlinson on Friday asking the elected prosecutor to ask a judge to appoint an attorney to represent him in his fight with the Board of Commissioners. By law, the prosecutor's office represents both the sheriff's office and the Board of Commissioners, and it would be a conflict of interest for it to represent both sides in a dispute between the two. Commissioner Michelle Hung, a Republican, backed up Stammitti's request on Tuesday. She voted to authorize the board to hire an attorney to represent Stammitti in the dispute but was outvoted 2-1 by fellow Republican commissioners David Moore and Jeff Riddell. "When will you be petitioning the Court to authorize the firm of Isaac, Wiles & Burkholder LLC and attorney Charles A. Schneider as outside counsel to represent the sheriff in the matter?" she asked Tomlinson, a Democrat, his chief of staff James Burge and Assistant Prosecutor Dan Petticord in an email. "If you have already done so, please forward along. If you haven't done so and will have the matter completed at some point in the near future, please forward along when completed," Hung wrote. Stammitti had requested that Schneider, a former Franklin County Common Pleas judge and chief of the Criminal Justice Section of the Ohio Attorney General's Office, be authorized to represent him. Moore and Riddell refused, saying Stammitti had an attorney on staff — former county prosecutor Dennis Will — and that the sheriff could spend money out of his own budget to hire legal representation. Commissioners had previously hired the law firm Dooley Gembala McLaughlin Pecora to represent them against Stammitti's claims. Moore bragged Friday that the board spent only $500 for attorney Matt Dooley's legal opinion. The disagreement is over a law that says the sheriff of any county with fewer than 750,000 residents is in charge of emergency 911 communications in that county unless the sheriff signs a waiver giving up that responsibility. That would include Lorain County, with just over 300,000 residents. Stammitti said he never signed a waiver. Moore, Riddell and Dooley disagreed: Stammitti gave up that role when he signed a memorandum of understanding with a previous board of commissioners in 2011, the year Lorain County 911 merged with the sheriff's office's dispatch services. The majority of the board backed up its position with Dooley's opinion in a March 1 letter. The board voted in December to go with the Multi-Agency Radio Communications System, or MARCS, to build Lorain County's future emergency radio communications infrastructure. The contract with Motorola was $13.9 million. Stammitti, Hung, county fire and police chiefs, multiple mayors, city councils, union leaders and union members including the Lorain County Deputies Association backed the nearly $8 million deal with Cleveland Communications Inc. for its L3 Harris radio system. Hung and former commissioner Matt Lundy, a Democrat, signed that contract in December 2022 at a meeting Moore did not attend. Over Hung's objection, Moore and Riddell rescinded the contract with CCI shortly after Riddell replaced Lundy in office. CCI sued the county for breach of contract in federal court, and that case is pending. Moore and Riddell have claimed the bidding process behind the CCI contract was rigged or improper. Two separate investigations by the sheriff's office and the Auditor of State's office have found no such evidence. Moore has said the issue is about radio communications infrastructure, not what radios Lorain County first responders prefer to use in the field. MARCS could take up to two years to install, test and be ready for use, the commissioners said in December. The State Highway Patrol, Ohio Department of Transportation and Ohio Department of Natural Resources all use MARCS. The state will provide Lorain County with $10 million in maintenance and system upgrades through 2044, Moore said at the time. The final cost is expected to be just under $17.3 million over the next 20 years. Contact Dave O'Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com.