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Nero A No Show For Key Vote On First Day
- Filed under: Moran / Nero, Ohio 2008
- Date: Jun 11,2008
Yesterday, Richard Nero had his first day as an Ohio House Representative. Nero was appointed to replace John Widowfield, who resigned because he sold Ohio State tickets bought with campaign money on Ebay for a profit. In honor of his new job, Nero posted a statement on his campaign website that reads: "Today I was called upon by the Ohio House leadership in Columbus and appointed to the role of state representative for the 42nd Ohio House District, which encompasses Cuyahoga Falls, Hudson, Munroe Falls, Silver Lake and Stow. With great pride, honor, and a sense of purpose and responsibility, I have answered this call." Well, he answered the call for half a day…
The Columbus Dispatch blog The Daily Briefing reports that Nero missed a key vote on his first day because he left the House because of a "scheduling conflict." According to the article, Nero cast a number of votes during his first day, "but when the House reconvened after 3 p.m. to take up one more, major vote — the final concurrence of the Great Lakes Compact — Nero was noticeably absent."
Think of what would happen to you on your first day at a new job if you missed a key assignment because you had left work? You'd be replaced.
Side note: I wonder if Richard Nero will need to order new campaign materials that read "Re-Elect" instead of "Elect" since he is the incumbent? I don't know the exact law, but I'm pretty sure Nero would need to make some change to the material his campaign distributes.
16 Responses for "Nero A No Show For Key Vote On First Day"
Nero flew back to Columbus from a corporate meeting to be sworn in, them had to return to his meeting. Tuesday was the only day he could take the oath and he was excused from the vote he missed. But he did cast votes on a number of bills that day so the record will show that he was there and voting. A non-starter of an issue.
He's also vaulted to the top of the House Republican priority list, which means they will probably spend a half million in the race for Nero. Nero is a Kevin Coughlin ally. Jon Husted and other Coughlin pals in the House will make sure they keep that district in Republican hands.
Weak.
It isnt like he knew weeks ago he would be there today, maybe he did have a conflict. Sometimes people miss votes. I have yet to hear you complain about Obama missing votes in the Senate. Yesterday Obama missed all three votes in the Senate. I also just looked at the Senate Roll Call from June 4 and see they had two votes, and Obama only voted one. Hmmmm. I guess he had a scheduling conflict.
Anyways he was never elected in the first place, he was appointed, so he can't really be "re-elected."
he can't have Re-elect because he wasn't elected but he can use "Keep" like Pry and Horrigan and Zeno Carano did because they were also appointed
C'mon Kyle you can do better with reporting other than petty things such as that. Or do I point out he left the Ohio HOUSE not the SENATE. Please check the facts, or do we have to? Hee hee hee.
Maybe Nero had fiddle practice that day.
Kyle:
I normally find your blogs interesting but I've really lost a lot of respect after this blog post. First off, your facts are consistently wrong (you called him Robert Nero in your first post) and now you say he's in the Senate. Second, this appointment was surely done on short notice. Do you even know why he missed the vote? Did you research, call or even care to ask? What if a family emergency came up, or a work conflict? It's certainly understandable that he be absent for an afternoon session giving the short time frame. At least he voted in the morning.
Then, you fail to mention that Tom Heydinger, the Democrat who replaced Matthew Barrett (who resigned after showing nude women to high schoolers, blamed it on his 14 year old son, only to find out he knew both the women - and it wasn't his wife) wasn't even in session yesterday to vote, at all. Why is his inaction not important to you?
I guess it's true that bloggers don't really have to be "journalists" and can avoid responsible reporting all together.
You've just lost a reader.
Keggle, I agree that this race should be at the top of the Republicans list. It is going to be competitive.
Ben, either you think it is okay for elected officials to miss key votes or you don't. You excuse Nero and then attack Obama for the same thing. Pick a side on this issue and get back to me.
Knowledgeable, good point. I'd imagine it would be keep.
Anonymous, thank you for catching that. My mistake.
Rep81, I'm guessing you may have a connection to Mr. Nero or the Ohio House Republicans. I'd encourage you to email Ben. He'd be happy to help get your perspective on this site. This post wasn't a State House update. It was a post about Mr. Nero missing a vote on his first day. My job on this site isn't to provide balanced coverage. I'm here to write about the Democrat perspective. Occasionally I will get small things wrong and I appreciate them being brought to my attention, but the meat of the story is correct and Mr. Nero missed the vote.
To be honest, I tried for about a half an hour to navigate the State House website to find the vote totals for the Great Lakes Compact vote. I had a lot of trouble finding my way around. I came to the conclusion that the vote totals had not been updated on the site yet for that day.
Kyle,
It would have been more of a story if he'd been in office a longer period of time. However, if you read yesterday's Cleveland Plain dealer, you would have seen that missing legislative meetings/sessions is commonplace as indicated by the Cleveland City Council meetings. As election time nears, the attendance numbers for candidates running for election or reelection will become more of an issue.
I'm not the one that has to take a position on missing votes, I didnt make the post.
What ?? You expect politicians to be an 9 to 5 regular kind of guy? How naive…..Nero seems to be setting a pattern on his first day in office. On the other hand, getting organized and acclamated does take some time
There are politicians from both parties who miss far too many votes. I don't know this guy from Adam and I'm not defending him. However, another angle to not voting on issues immediately after being appointed is that while the others representatives or state senators have been fully briefed on these issues, he may have felt insufficiently informed to vote. What gets me are those who have been there for decades and still fail to show far too often.
"Ben, either you think it is okay for elected officials to miss key votes or you don't. You excuse Nero and then attack Obama for the same thing. Pick a side on this issue and get back to me."
Unless I missed your attack on Obama's attendance record, you've got to be kidding, Kyle. Right?
Kyle, there is a difference between giving the "democratic perspective" on issues and giving factually errant details or omitting details in order to paint a negative picture about an individual. I am amazed that you do not think it should be a priority to get all the facts and at least give them in balanced fashion. It is still possible for you to research and get all the facts about an a story and present them in your blogs and still express your "democratic perspective" at the same time. That is called responsible journalism. You will find that the more facts that you present, the less people will question your already very questionable credibility. Even the liberal lions on the ABJ editorial board present a balanced account of the facts before the they go on their anti-conservative diatribes. I can't believe that I am saying this, but learn from them…
I dont agree with the context of the post, I think it is a weak argument. The selective use of missing votes - on someone who probably didnt even know it would be their first day is really not going anywhere. Also, I'm not the one who has said anything about anyone missing votes in any legislative bodies this, so trying to spin it back on me also carries no weight in my mind.
That said, everyone makes mistakes. It was a minor mistake. Kyle put the post up late and made an oversight, probably in haste to get it up. Like I said, techincally his story was right, he just made a minor error. We've all done it. Even Barack Obama. He is a good blogger and I am happy to work with him. It wasnt like he was trying to mislead anyone.
Ha. Ben, I appreciate the understanding and defense. It seems like there are a lot of Nero fans on the site. I guess that is good news for him and maybe it speaks to the high profile of that race. It is going to be a fun one to watch.
Yes, it will be Kyle. Also you are welcome.
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