PARKERSBURG - Wood County Democrats met Saturday to select delegates to June's state convention in Charleston.
Harold Brown, chairman of the Wood County Democratic Executive Committee, said while the convention format is new to the party it appears to work well.
"This is the second election year for the convention," he said. "It went really smooth for us. I prefer this over the election, absolutely."
West Virginia Republicans still elect their convention delegates in the primary election.
Brown said those who were interested in becoming delegates to the state convention, or to support those seeking to be delegates, came to the county convention Saturday morning in the meeting rooms of the Judge Black Courthouse Annex.
Wood County will have the fourth largest delegation behind Kanawha, Cabell and Logan counties.
"We had some who came early and registered their interest to be delegates and we decided to accept them," he said. "We got all the information we needed to make them legitimate candidates. There was no objection since they did not displace anyone who wanted to participate."
Brown said the convention did not last as long as expected by some, taking about an hour and 20 minutes.
"It was very well organized," he said. "There were no major problems. We had all the information from the state party, we may have overdone the planning. The teams who planned and carried it out did an excellent job."
Brown said the only problem the party had was accessing the county clerk database to verify registrations as Democrats.
The county party has the number of men and women delegates needed for the state convention scheduled for June 8 and 9 in Charleston.
Saturday's convention was not like a convention at the state and national level with debates, speeches and votes. Brown said it was more of a numbers game.
"We did elect one person each to the three standing committees for the convention in Charleston," he said. "Teresa Miller was elected to the rules committee, Charles Meyers to the resolutions committee and Paul Miller to the credentials committee."
Brown said local leaders are expecting a calm state convention compared to 2008.
"In Charleston four years ago was like a national convention with two candidates looking for support," he said. "Of course we won't have that this year, it will be mild compared to 2008."
With the national convention relatively close in Charlotte, N.C., he said many people are interested in attending that event set for the week of Sept. 3. Brown said a few people came in for forms to send in by May 8 to announce they are interested in running for delegates to the national convention.
