YPSILANTI TWP., MI – Some Ypsilanti Township leaders are calling for an investigation into alleged collusion between the township clerk and a trustee after the two changed which jobs they are running for on the last day to file for the August primary election.

Clerk Karen Lovejoy Roe and Trustee Heather Jarrell Roe each filed to keep their current positions in early March, county records show. But, the two dropped out of those races on Tuesday, April 21, and then filed in different races.

Jarrell Roe filed for the township clerk race and Lovejoy Roe filed for the District 5 Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners Democratic primary. Lovejoy Roe is Jarrell Roe’s mother-in-law.

Township Trustee Monica Ross-Williams and Supervisor Brenda Stumbo, both Democrats, allege the two “colluded to eliminate other candidates to file for the position of clerk,” Ross-Williams said during a Friday, April 24 video conference.

No other candidates had filed for township clerk job before Tuesday, so Jarrell Roe is now the sole candidate for that job. Lovejoy Roe now joins the Democratic race for a Board of Commissioners seat with Michael White, Justin Hodge and Denise Kirchoff.

Jarrell Roe and Lovejoy Roe did not respond to calls seeking comment and did not address the allegations in email communications.

Lovejoy Roe has been township clerk since 2008. She has been in Ypsilanti Township politics since 1988 as trustee, supervisor and a two-year term on the County Board of Commissioners.

“I am blessed to have been able to serve the residents of our community for 30 years,” Lovejoy Roe said in an email. “I have always taken my oaths of office for supervisor and clerk of Ypsilanti Township and as Washtenaw County commissioner very seriously.

"To earn and have the trust of those you represent is a great honor. I am continuously grateful and humbled to be able to support, help and make a difference in the lives of those I serve. I look forward to the future of continuing to serve in whatever capacity that I am able to.”

Jarrell Roe, who was elected in 2016, said in an email that she has not received no communication from her colleagues other than congratulations.

“I have greatly enjoyed serving the hard-working residents of Ypsilanti Township for the last four years and look forward to continuing that work, in harmonious partnership with my fellow colleagues,” Jarrell Roe said in the email.

Kirchoff and White said they were particularly concerned with Lovejoy Roe’s late entry because the three other candidates are African American, making it the first time that seat could be held by a person of color. The candidates questioned why Lovejoy Roe, who is white, would join last minute and affect that possibility.

“This is not playing a race card, this is a data point," White said. "And if we keep on acting as if this is not occurring, that there was something to this that three African Americans, three black people are running for one seat, and then that temperature changes on the very last day. There has to be more to it.”

Voters, however, have the final say on who wins the primary and advances to the November general election.

Stumbo said she was shocked and embarrassed when Lovejoy Roe told her on Tuesday night that she joined the Board of Commissioners race.

“I just said, ‘I thought you were up to something,’” Stumbo said. “I did say that. I thought you're up to something and I thought you would probably get a family member to run. You know, it's fine that other family members run but you don't let that family member be the only person on the ballot. Our conversation was done after that I had nothing else to say to her. Nothing.”

Ross-Williams has said she intends to file a complaint with the Secretary of State’s office, the Michigan Attorney General or the American Civil Liberties Union.

A similar last-minute switch raised eyebrows in 2010 when then-commissioner Jessica Ping pulled out of the race for District 3 Commissioner at the last minute. Her sister Alicia Ping replaced her.

Democrats said at the time the fact that the Ping sisters waited until the last minute to make the switch without telling anyone was disingenuous, adding that other 3rd District candidates might have come forward if they had known it was going to be an open seat, and they wouldn’t have to face an incumbent.

Alicia Ping files to run in place of sister in Washtenaw County’s 3rd District commissioner race

Independent candidates have until July 16 to file for the November general election.

The Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners 5th district represents most of Ypsilanti Township and Augusta Township. The seat is vacant after incumbent Ruth Ann Jamnick, a Democrat, declined to seek reelection.

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