Ohio Democratic Party is laying off more than half its staff

COLUMBUS — More than half of the permanent staffers at the Ohio Democratic Party have been let go under the leadership of the party's new chairman, multiple Democratic sources have confirmed. The party's headquarters in Columbus is going from a staff of around 20 to 6 or 8 people, five sources close to the party say. Earlier this month, Democrats elected a new chairman, Liz Walters, to replace David Pepper, who decided to step down after the election. Sam Melendez, director of the party's Main Street Initiative for recruiting local candidates, announced on Twitter Friday that he was being let go. Melendez had been in the role since 2015. "I don't know what the future holds for Main Street. What I do know is that it is necessary and what a state party should be doing. So I hope the new leadership continues this effort. If they don't, they do so at their own peril," Melendez tweeted. The party's data department is among the staffers also let go, sources say. Staffers were laid off with no more than a week's notice and no severance, sources say, and the staffers let go are expected to be replaced with independent contractors in a bid to save money. The party's communications director Kirstin Alvanitakis said she was not leaving, but added she couldn't comment further on personnel matters. She referred also to an interview Walters gave to the Statehouse News Bureau where she said: "There will be a realignment of strategy and structure and we will be working on our stakeholders to really outline what that is in the next month or two." Walters also said that as policy, the party doesn't comment on personnel matters. ___ (c)2021 The Blade (Toledo, Ohio) Visit The Blade (Toledo, Ohio) at www.toledoblade.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.