Muskingum County Commissioners Candidates Forum Recap

Zanesville, Ohio- Thursday’s night event took place in Elson Hall at Ohio University Zanesville.

The event featured four candidates vying for two Muskingum County Commissioner seats.

In one race, Republican Challenger Mollie Crooks faced Democrat Incumbent Commissioner Jerry Lavy.  In the other race, Republican Incumbent Commissioner Cindy Cameron faced challenger Dale Phillips.

Moderating the debate was WHIZ’s George Hiotis and retired Ohio University Zanesville Political Science Professor Dr. Jim Jordan.

Each candidate addressed their own opening statement and then were asked questions by both George Hiotis and Dr. Jordan.

Candidates were then given a chance to ask a question to their challenger.

We got the chance to talk to both Cindy Cameron and Dale Phillips on the issue of the capacity size and overflow in both the city and county jail.

“I think there should be a merging between the city and county jail,” said Phillips.  Why spend two monies on two buildings when we’re not that big of a community that could warrant that.  I think that we could build one and we would be good.”

Cindy Cameron however is currently opposed to the idea of merging both the city and county jail.

“The city jail is full and the county jail is full,” said Cameron.  “How are we going to merge them together when we can’t even house what we have now.”  Cameron said that she thinks that they should organize all of the proper officials together to help work towards a resolution for the issue first to explore all options.

We then asked both Jerry Lavy and Mollie Crooks what they thought was the greatest asset and biggest weakness in Muskingum County.

“The strong financial condition that the county is in right now, which I have strived for the last eight years to keep it there,” said Lavy.  “When I came into the office the county was virtually broke and over that time we have worked to secure the stability of the county.”

Lavy said all counties have their own issues and he said that if there’s one that would need to be focused on, it would be the opiate drug problem in the county.

Mollie Crooks said that one of the biggest assets in the county is the geographic location.

“The fact that we are located on I70 and just 30 miles from I77 is a fabulous opportunity for a variety of different businesses,” said Crooks.  “We also have an Appalachian culture and that is self-sufficient and hard-working individuals, plus we have a great educational environment so we have many assets.”

Crooks said that the counties biggest weakness is a lack of vision.

“I think that our weakness is that there’s a lack of vision, there’s no plan for how to coordinate all those things and how to maximize that to make us the best county that we can be.”

If you would like to watch the how debate, please visit our Facebook page at WHIZ-TV.