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October 22, 2021
Each election year, voters in Franklin County are responsible for electing our judges. Many feel uninformed about the candidates’ credentials and about the impact judges have on their daily lives.
Without question, the work of our judiciary has a significant impact on individuals, corporations, and our overall community. Their importance to our society is as significant as any elected official.
This year, there are nine races for the Franklin County Municipal Court, seven of which are contested. In order to help voters make more informed decisions about the candidates they elect for judge, the Columbus Bar Association offers information on Franklin County judicial candidates through our Judge the Candidates website. It’s non-partisan and unbiased, designed to offer information about the process of electing judges, the length of term limits and the organization of the county court system. Visitors can also access the current and previous results of the Judicial Performance Poll that summarizes how local attorneys assess the performance of judges, and the Preference Poll, in which attorneys select their preferred candidate in each contested election.
We also provide candidate ratings from our Judicial Screening Committee, a politically-balanced committee made up of Democrats, Republicans and Independents. They interview each candidate and assess them on a number of different criteria before coming together and voting on what rank to give them out of a five-star system, with five stars being the highest rank and one star being the lowest. Aside from the one-star rank, which requires 70 percent of votes to be cast in that category, whichever rank gets the majority of votes is what’s granted to the candidate. All results from the Judicial Screening Committee are available online for public consumption.
It’s our hope and our aim that voters use this information to help them make an informed decision at the polls. Visit the website today: www.judgethecandidates.org.
When judges are on the ballot in Franklin County, be informed. Visit the CBA's Judge the Candidates website for impartial, nonpartisan information about your judges and judicial candidates.
