MANSFIELD — The Richland County Democratic Party’s annual Fall Dinner is scheduled for Thursday at the Mid-Ohio Educational Service Center, 890 W. Fourth St.
A social hour will begin at 5 p.m. with the dinner to follow at 6. The donation for this dinner is $40 per person or $300 for a reserved table of six.
The keynote speaker will be David Pepper.
Along with being an attorney, author, former council member in the Cincinnati area and a former county commissioner, Pepper was also the former chair of the Ohio Democratic Party.
He continues to be a force in Ohio politics, appearing on national news and talk
shows on networks like MSNBC & CNN.
His recent non-fiction works — Laboratories of Autocracy (2021) and Saving Democracy: A User’s Manual (2023) — dissect what he describes as the attack on democracy taking place in states like Ohio, and guide everyday citizens on steps they can take to lift democracy.
Born and raised in Cincinnati, Pepper earned his B.A. magna cum laude from Yale University, where he was Phi Beta Kappa, and later earned his J.D. from Yale Law School.
Pepper served on Cincinnati City Council from 2001-2005, then on the Hamilton County Commission from 2007-2010, including as its president in 2009-2010. He was the
Democratic candidate for Ohio Auditor in 2010 and Ohio Attorney General in 2014. He
was elected chair of the Ohio Democratic Party in December 2014.
Pepper has also written four novels that bridge real-world politics and fiction—including A Simple Choice (Putnam, June 2022). His first novel, The People’s House, earned
praise for having “predicted the Russia scandal.” The Wall Street Journal named
Pepper “one of the best political-thriller writers on the scene.”
Another well-known Ohioan, Dr. Amy Acton, will be in attendance as a special guest at the dinner.
Acton is a physician and community leader who has spent more than 35 years pursuing her passion for public health and wellness. She is in private practice in Preventive Medicine and Global Public Health.
She worked as the director of the Ohio Department of Health during early days of the COVID pandemic.
This will be the last major local Democratic event before the Nov. 5 election.
For reservations or more information, please contact the Richland County Democratic Party’s Vice Chair, Venita Shoulders, at 419-564-0486 or venitashoulders@gmail.com