by Lauren Krupar
Hudson Hub-Times
Associate Editor
Voters will determine March 4 who will lead the county's Democratic and Republican parties for the next two years.
All 475 Summit County precinct committee seats in both parties are on the ballot for the presidential primary. While some races are without candidates, the majority of the precinct committee races have at least one candidate filed.
In the Democratic Party, 13 races are contested while in the Republican Party, 170 races are contested.
Republican Party officials did not return calls seeking comment by press time.
In the Democratic Party, precinct committee members perform four basic functions. In addition to attending meetings of the Summit County Democratic Party and Central Committee, precinct committee representatives also recruit poll workers, distribute campaign literature within the precinct and participate in election activities within the precinct.
"The precinct committee people are the members of the central committee, which is the governing body of the Summit County Democratic Party," party representative Russell Balthis said. "They represent the Democratic Party in their neighborhood."
Those seeking to be a precinct committee representative for the county's Democratic Party must be a registered voter who lives in the precinct and has voted in at least one Democratic primary in the last two years.
Candidates also cannot have voted in another party's primary in the last two years.
The Democratic central committee has 405 members and 70 vacancies, which can be filled by appointment.