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It seems that Lauren Welch has caught the political bug.
Just three months after former Ward 3 Councilman Kerry McCormack chose Lauren Welch to serve out the remainder of his term on Cleveland City Counil, Welch is announcing her own campaign as she nears the end of her short-lived tenure at City Hall—a bid for the Ohio Statehouse.
Welch has collected enough signatures to officially launch a campaign for District 20, a seat that’s been held by Terrence Upchurch since January 2023. Upchurch himself will be termed-out come November.
District 20 encompasses most of Downtown Cleveland, Slavic Village and Central, and runs up to University Circle and North Collinwood.
Neighborhoods that Welch, as a Downtown resident for the past two years, believes she’s well-equipped to advocate for. She told Scene there are two reasons behind the run —she loves the work and wants that love to translate into state policy.
“For me, it’s about having competent individuals in these seats who are able to work across the aisle,” she said. “We need common-sense folks who understand these systems who are ready to fight for us in these places. And to be occupying seats to actually do the work.”
Welch’s brief three-month stint as Ward 3’s representative was brief but she helped open up a kiosk on Public Square and used casino funds for the Warehouse District. She ran a series of newsletters, TL;3, that took a more conversational approach to what was happening in the city.
“Hold space for joy just as deliberatively as you hold space for work,” Welch wrote in one of her newsletters.
Born and raised in Ohio City, Welch moved to Los Angeles in her twenties to work in communications. She’s been on three boards—RTA, the Cleveland Press Club and Environmental Health Watch—and worked at Say Yes! Cleveland before McCormack handed off the Ward 3 job to her in October. She was one of Crain’s Notable Leaders in Communications in 2024.
At 37, Welch is a newcomer to politics but champions her youthful energy as an asset to the job. She feels that public policy should meet lived experience, whether that be through funding public transit, tightening curfews to curb car break-ins, or fully supporting Cleveland’s co-response model for crisis reponse á la Tanisha’s Law.
In her view, those pieces of local policy that have clear influences at the Statehouse.
“What Council reinforced for me is that many of the challenges facing our neighborhoods are decisions that are made and shaped by decisions made in Columbus,” Welch said.
Mike Seals, a labor organizer who ran against Upchurch in 2022, is Welch’s only challenger so far, according to Cuyahoga County Board of Elections records. Once her signatures are verified, Welch will compete for votes against him and anyone else in the May 5 primary election.
Welch said she’s already doorknocking with help from her team of 10, yet is still on the lookout for a campaign manager. If she’s elected, Welch said she’ll operate a people’s-first seat, one that balances dollars for lakefront development—she supports Burke closing—equally with issues around gun control and mental health.
And she’s not looking to be your run-of-the-mill career politician.
“I’m a girl who went to Jane Addams High on East 30th,” she said. “I grew up in Ohio City. I’ve been in various neighborhoods, in this community, doing the work. And I want to hear from them what’s most important in this moment.”
“I mean, I don’t want to wake up in November and regret the representation that we have,” she said. “I’ll say that.”
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Mark Oprea
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