Douglas County Commissioner Thellman seeks reelection; Derusseau yet to file as deadline looms

photo by: Mackenzie Clark/Journal-World File Photo

Douglas County Commissioners Nancy Thellman, left, and Michelle Derusseau are pictured at a commission meeting on Feb. 20, 2019.

Story updated at 1:29 p.m. Thursday

With just a few days left before the election filing deadline, only one of the two Douglas County Commissioners who are up for reelection have officially stepped up to retain their seats.

On Thursday, Commissioner Nancy Thellman filed to run for reelection, while Commissioner Michelle Derusseau had yet to make her intentions clear, according to the Douglas County Clerk’s Office. The filing deadline is noon Monday.

Thellman had previously told the Journal-World she planned to file before the deadline. But Derusseau has not responded to the Journal-World’s requests for clarification on her position.

Thellman’s and Derusseau’s seats are up for election this fall. The commission’s third seat is held by Patrick Kelly, a Democrat, whose term expires in 2023.

The only other candidate to file for either commissioner race is Karen Willey, who is a Democrat running to serve in the county’s Third District seat. That seat, which represents the western part of Douglas County, is currently held by Derusseau, who is a Republican. The county’s Second District, which represents the eastern side of the county, is held by Thellman, a Democrat.

If no other candidates file, Thellman and Willey would not face any formal challengers for the seats.

The lack of candidates for the commission’s seats comes when the commission faces tough decisions related to its budget, as tax revenues likely decline with the economic downturn associated with the coronavirus pandemic. It also comes while the county is working on a controversial $29.6 million expansion of its jail, which all three commissioners supported.

Whether those issues are playing into the candidate filings is unclear. Additionally, it is unclear whether any candidates specifically opposed to the county jail expansion project will be throwing their hats into the ring.

In 2018, local faith-based group Justice Matters successfully campaigned to vote down the county’s original plan to expand the jail. But the group does not appear to be taking its fight against the project to the commissioner election.

That’s because nonprofit organizations are not permitted to get involved in such races, unlike with the jail-expansion referendum, said Ben MacConnell, lead organizer for the group.

“Referendums and voter education are different animals because you are lobbying (and) educating the electorate, not an individual candidate,” MacConnell said in an email to the Journal-World.

Instead, MacConnell said the group was focused on its ongoing lawsuit against the county, which argues that county commissioners are not allowing residents to vote or petition against the plan to fund an expansion of the jail, despite the group’s belief that the county has an obligation to do so under state law.

The county has argued for dismissal of the lawsuit because it believes it has the authority to issue bonds for the project through the 1-cent sales tax referendum that county voters approved in 1994.


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