The Coles County Democratic Party is struggling to fill out its ticket for this year’s elections, allowing several Republican candidates to run unopposed.

The Democrats have yet to field a local candidate for either state senator for the U.S. House of Representatives, and are running only one candidate, lawyer John Hayden, for state representative in the Mattoon district.

The Republicans, meanwhile, are running current state representative Dale Righter and U.S. representative Timothy Johnson for state senator in the 55th District and the U.S. House of Representatives in the 15th District, respectively.

In addition, four GOP candidates – Ronald Hunt, Chapin Rose, Gerald W. Smith and Lynda Warfel Fisher – are competing for state representative in the 110th District.

Robert Crowder, the chairman of the Coles County Democratic Party, said he did not know why his party was fielding so few candidates for local offices.

“No one wants to take it on,” Crowder said. “No one wants to express themselves.”

But Crowder said this year’s lack of Democratic candidates was not unusual.

“It’s about the same every time because (Coles County) is a Republican district,” he said.

Instead, Crowder said his party will focus on races for other local offices, such as an open judgeship in the 10th Judicial Circuit and two County Board seats.

Crowder said he hopes to continue the progress his party has made in the area in recent years.

“This used to be a strictly Republican district,” Crowder said. “But now, it’s just about 50/50. We have the sheriff, the state’s attorney and coroner, and the County Board is tied six to six. We’re tied.”

Max Coffey, the chairman for the Coles County Republican Party, could not explain the lack of Democratic candidates either.

“I don’t know. We’re just lucky, I guess,” Coffey said.

However, Coffey disagreed that the Democrats have “tied” the Republicans and said that he expects the GOP to win back control of the Country Board, as well as the house and state representative races.

Coffey said, though, that fielding quality candidates was more important than beating the Democrats.

“I think we need to give the voters good choices,” he said. “I’m not sure we’ve always given them good choices. We need to spend more time submitting a better ticket.

“Many (candidates) spend too much time trying to run down the opposition instead of building up their own party,” Coffey said. “I’ve stressed to our candidates that we sometimes forget that it is not the job of the taxpayers to serve the politicians, but instead the reverse.”

Coffey said he expects the main issues of the campaign to be taxes, education and the economy.

“People are really concerned about the taxes in the county,” Coffey said. “Candidates will have to appeal to the taxpayers. And I think everyone is concerned about jobs, especially in this county.”

Redistricting helps GOP

Under the new redistricting plan passed by the Illinois Legislature this past June, Coles County has moved from the 19th Congressional District to the 15th Congressional District.

Where Coles County was the northernmost county of the 19th District, which covered all of Southeastern Illinois and extended down to the Ohio River, the newly revamped 15th District extends north through Champaign County to Iroquois and Ford counties.

Although current 19th District representative David Phelps, D-El Dorado, has expressed dissatisfaction with the new district map, Coffey said redistricting would “not affect (Coles County) directly.”

Actually, Coffey said that redistricting would “benefit us in Coles County, since for the first time in some time, (Coles County) will have a Republican congressman.

“We’re fortunate not to be split up like some other counties,” he said.