By Gary Ogle
gogle@wbcowqel.com
In the battle of former Bucyrus mayors, Dan Ross defeated Michael Jacobs in the Democrat primary to earn a chance to return to City Hall.
Although Ross led throughout the evening, the final tally was less than seven percentage points favoring Ross over the man who replaced him. Ross garnered 168 votes to Jacobs’ 147 in the light turnout.
Ross, who also served the city of Bucyrus as a firefighter and fire chief, says he’s glad to return to local politics after resigning as office over an issue of whether his residence was in the city limits.
“I’m pretty excited about getting back into it. I like government. Many, many people asked me to run. I’m very happy we have gotten this far,” Ross said. “Of course we have a lot of work to do before November.”
Jacobs, a longtime Bucyrus City Council member, was appointed to fill Ross’s unexpired term and then lost to the late Roger Moore in a special election. Moore died unexpectedly mid-term and was replaced by current Mayor Jeff Reser who will be Ross’s opponent in the General Election.
After accepting congratulations from Jacobs for the primary victory, Ross turned his thoughts to the issues he’ll focus on for the November election.
“I think the community has a lot of good things going for it,” Ross said. “The couple things we really got to start looking at is these rundown homes, vacant home. The police and sheriff have been looking at the drug problem of course.”
The only race in the city of Bucyrus was in essence uncontested. Incumbent City Council member Wanda Sharrock and former City Council member Daniel Wirebaugh were both on the ballot for council-at-large seats in the Democrat primary. However, there are three seats open so both will be on the November ballot.