Toledo City Councilman Peter Ujvagi will not seek to retain his District 3 seat in November.
Mr. Ujvagi, a Democrat who returned to city council in 2016 after he served as an at-large councilman from 1993 to 2002, wrote to Lucas County Democratic Party Chairman Kurt Young on Monday to announce his decision.
“I wish to inform you that I shall not submit my petitions for re-election to the District 3 City Council position. I intend to continue to promote all my efforts in my remaining term to working for the people and issues of Dist 3 [sic], in East Toledo and the Old South End,” he said in an email. “I have been honored to serve in elective and administrative offices for more than thirty eight years. I look forward to continuing the fight for neighborhoods, our working families, and respect for diversity. As an immigrant I will continue to work to welcome others who add so much to our great country.”
District 3 includes all of East Toledo and the city’s Old South End.
Republican Glen Cook already announced he intends to run for the seat. He was about 350 votes from beating Mr. Ujvagi in 2015 and said he is more confident this time around because he has the backing of the Lucas County Republican Party.
“We’ll see how it goes,” he said. “Peter has served our community for a long time, and I’m sorry to hear he’s not running. That was a surprise.”
Democrat Bob McCloskey, a longtime Toledo councilman who spent 20 months in a federal prison camp after he was convicted in 2006 for accepting bribes, is considering another run for city council. Whether he could legally hold the seat is uncertain, as state law forbids a public servant convicted of bribery from holding office.
Two others have pulled petitions for the seat: a registered Democrat named Robert Worthington, 24, and a registered Republican named William Theisen, 52. The deadline to file with the Lucas County Board of Elections is July 12.
The county Democratic Party endorsed Mr. Ujvagi in March, and Mr. Young said they’ll open up the screening process “very quickly” for District 3 candidates following his decision not to run.
“We would very much like to endorse someone if possible, but again it is a difficult thing to ask someone who was not planning on running to prepare for a September primary and a November general election,” he said.
Mr. Ujvagi, 70, is a former chairman of the Lucas County Democratic Party, a retired Lucas County administrator, and a former state representative.
In the 1970s he was a member of the President’s National Commission on Neighborhoods and a field director for the National Center for Urban Ethnic Affairs in Washington.
He was elected to Toledo City Council in the 1980s and ’90s and served as council president from 1998 to 2002. He was then elected to the state House, representing District 47 for eight years before becoming Lucas County’s administrator in 2010.
He played a key role in forming Welcome Toledo-Lucas County in 2014, a nonprofit that works to support immigrants and people of diverse cultures who make the county their home.
Mr. Ujvagi said Monday his decision not to seek reelection was a combination of factors, including a need to focus on improving his physical health. He said he recognized he put the Democratic Party in a tough position by deciding not to run after receiving its endorsement, but he stands by his choice.
“I think this is the right decision at the right time,” he said.
He said competition from Mr. Cook or McCloskey had “nothing to do with it,” and that he is confident that he would have won reelection.
The councilman said he intends to be an active councilman through the end of the year, and he is proud of the momentum building in both parts of his district. He cited the new Glass City Metropark along the Maumee River in East Toledo and $2 million in improvements coming to South Toledo’s Danny Thomas Park as examples.
“It’s something that I worked very hard on and tried to promote and to make happen,” he said. “And in many ways I think that is the job of a councilman, to reach out and find projects, initiatives, and people to try to make [the district] better.”
Mr. Ujvagi said he is disappointed he hasn’t done more to address blight and absentee landlords in Toledo neighborhoods. He would not rule out the possibility of running for office again but said he would only consider it if his health improves.
“I learned a long time ago to never say never,” he said. “If I can run a 5K sometime in the next couple of years, well maybe there will be life left in this old body yet.”
Staff writer Sammy Westfall contributed to this report.
First Published June 17, 2019, 9:49 p.m.