Chillicothe and Ross County — The Ross County Democrats held their annual Fall Fish Fry “FUNdraiser” at the Pump House, and hosted a speaker from statewide politics, as well as local candidates.
Among the various election season meet-and-greets (like their Republican opponents), the larger gathering allowed several candidates to introduce themselves to constituents for the fall election, outside the Chillicothe art gallery on September 25th, 2025.
Two prominent candidates were the those for Chillicothe Municipal Court Chillicothe judges: Mayor Luke Feeney and local attorney Angela Hirsch.
The special guest speaker was the Honorable Tracy Maxwell Heard, Inaugural Chair of the Ohio Democratic Party African American Caucus. She was was the minority leader while serving in the Ohio House of the General Assembly from 2007 to 2014.
Her speech explained how Democrats need to respond to what is happening in politics and culture, and she presented strategies for that. She said Democrats have the numbers, but need to mobilize them.
Heard said one tool for that is for everyone to be prepared to use an app on their smart phone to register voters or confirm they are registered, to help fight voter purges.
Two Democratic candidates are running for separate judgeships on the Chillicothe Municipal Court – which deals with lower-level cases within the county, such as drug charges and traffic tickets.
In his stump speech, Mayor Luke Feeney said that as mayor, he saw that the Ross County justice system is not being proactive when it need to. He said he saw an opportunity to help that when one of the Municipal Court judges retired.
Feeney’s Republican opponent is Jason Miller.
In her speech, Angela Hirsch pointed out that she is a lifelong county resident who saw that after the last swearing-in, there were no women as county officials.
Hirsch’s Republican opponent is incumbent Keith Washburn, who was appointed to fill out the remaining four years of Toni Eddy’s (R) term after she retired.
(And yes, Hirsch is a member of the fruit farm family.)
Hear samples from the speeches of the two judge candidates, as well as short interviews with the featured speaker and Hirsch, below.
