WOOSTER — Wayne County voters backed Republican candidates by wide margins in the Nov. 3 general election even as Democrats won Ohio’s top statewide races, according to the unofficial results from the Wayne County Board of Elections. The counts now move into the official canvass, which must be certified by Tuesday, Nov. 24. With 64 of 66 precincts reporting, more than 41,000 votes were counted in the governor’s race among the county’s 69,028 registered voters.
Republican Vivek Ramaswamy carried Wayne County in the governor’s race with 24,376 votes to 15,259 for Democrat Amy Acton and 1,624 for Libertarian Don Kissick in the unofficial Secretary of State returns. Acton won statewide and will become Ohio’s first woman elected governor. The U.S. Senate race split the same way locally: Republican Jon Husted took 24,699 Wayne County votes to 14,278 for Democrat Sherrod Brown, while Brown won the seat statewide.
Wayne County also voted heavily for State Issue 3, the constitutional amendment requiring voter identification, approving it 28,799 to 10,221 in the unofficial count. The measure passed statewide as well, cementing Ohio’s photo ID requirement in the state constitution.
School funding produced a split verdict. The Wooster Daily Record, reporting the board’s unofficial results, found that three of the six countywide school levies passed: Chippewa Local’s 1 percent earned income tax renewal, 2,271 to 1,918; Dalton Local’s property tax renewal, 1,599 to 957; and the Wayne County Joint Vocational School District’s 0.5-mill renewal, 23,338 to 17,347. Northwestern Local’s renewal failed by just 17 votes, 1,403 to 1,420, and new income taxes proposed by Orrville City Schools, 1,874 to 2,216, and Triway Local, 1,577 to 3,176, were rejected.
Across the rest of the ballot, the Daily Record reported that 25 of the 36 issues before Wayne County voters passed, six failed and five received no votes. Rittman voters approved a long list of city charter amendments, rejecting only a proposal to shorten the residency requirement for elected officers, 948 to 997. A possible Doylestown–Chippewa Township merger split the two communities: Doylestown backed a merger commission 890 to 465, while Chippewa Township rejected it 1,743 to 1,279. Township fire and emergency levies in Canaan, Clinton and Wooster townships also passed.
None of those numbers is final yet. The Wayne County Board of Elections explains that Election Night results are unofficial: they exclude provisional ballots and absentee ballots postmarked by the day before the election and received within four days afterward. So a margin as thin as Northwestern’s 17 votes is not settled until the canvass ends.
Under Ohio law, county boards begin the official canvass between five and 15 days after Election Day — as early as Sunday, Nov. 8 and no later than Wednesday, Nov. 18 — reviewing records and counting every remaining eligible ballot, Secretary of State Frank LaRose’s office said. Wayne County must certify no later than Tuesday, Nov. 24, the 21st day after the election, under the Secretary of State’s canvass directive. The Secretary of State’s office then reviews the county certifications before the final statewide certification and post-election audits. Until Nov. 24, every Wayne County result from Nov. 3 remains unofficial.