Indiana has an interregnum from politics the year after a presidential election. Since 2016 was a presidential election year, 2017 was quiet on the political front. That quiet will now be filled with political activity. The filing deadline has come and gone for the 2018 primary election set for May 8th. We now know the names of the candidates on the primary ballot.
There are plenty of offices up for grabs at the state and county level. For purposes of this missive, I’ll discuss a few county offices, but focus on what impacts Fishers most directly, the township races.
Township governments in Indiana mainly provide poor relief and fire service for its residents not located in a city. Delaware and Fall Creek Townships contract with the City of Fishers to provide fire protection service to areas of each township not within the city limits of Fishers.
Fishers is contained within two townships…Delaware to the west and Fall Creek to the east. Each township has a 3-person board and a trustee. Delaware Township Trustee Debbie Driskell is unopposed in the Republican primary election. However, the primary contest for Delaware Township Board has a wrinkle we haven’t seen in many years locally – a primary election race in the Democratic Party.
Four Democrats have filed for three spots on the November ballot. They are: Dayna Colbert, former City Council candidate Kent Nelson, Mary E. Ray and Bianca Zaklikowski.
The Republicans have a primary race for Delaware Township Board as well. All three current board members….Rick Fain, Ed Pierce and Marilyn Shenkel….are running for re-election. They are being challenged in the GOP primary by David Giffel. With four hopefuls on the GOP ballot, the top three vote-getters will appear on the November 6th general election ballot.
Moving over to Fall Creek Township, incumbent Trustee Doug Allman is being challenged in the primary by Ben Slota. All three incumbent board members, Brian Baehl, Chad Garrard and Jason Meyer, have filed for re-election. They are being challenged by two fellow Republicans, Michael J. Brown and Greg Dewald.
No Democrats filed for Fall Creek Township office.
Bottom line, the only township office-holder unopposed in the Delaware & Fall Creek Township primary election is Delaware Township Trustee Debbie Driskell.
At the Hamilton County level, the sheriff’s race is sure to get lots of attention. Four Republicans are vying for the nomination in the May 8th primary: Bill Clifford, Eddie Moore, Dennis Quakenbush and Mitch Russell. Jason Sloderback had filed to run for sheriff, but withdrew his candidacy in mid-January.
Incumbent Hamilton County Commissioner Christine Altman is being challenged by Matt Milam. Milam led the (unsuccessful) Home Place battle to prevent annexation into Carmel.
Of the four district races for County Council, only one is unopposed, that is District 2 Councilor Amy Massillamany.
Although Democrats filed for only a few offices in the primary, the county Democratic Chairman, Joe Weingarten, has the right under Indiana law to appoint candidates for the general election, if done so by a deadline in the law, normally in mid-summer.
It should also be noted that the candidate listing I have is the one posted on the Hamilton County Election office Web site of Sunday night, February 11th. If there were any last-minute filings that didn’t make it on that list, I would not know of it.
Because Hamilton County is so heavily Republican, most of the contentious political campaigns have been waged in the primary, and 2018 will be no exception. Democrats are beginning to see signs that 2018 could be a generally good year for them. It’s way too early to know whether that will have any impact on Hamilton County.
Let the election campaigns begin.