Elected officials and other Ohioans gathered at Cleveland City Hall Thursday to pay their respects to former mayor, governor and U.S. Senator George Voinovich. Voinovich, who died last weekend at age 79, laid in state and will be buried Friday.
From Ohio Public Radio station WKSU, Kevin Niedermier has more.
Throughout the day about a hundred or so people passed by Voinovich’s coffin in the city hall rotunda. During an afternoon ceremony he was eulogized by Mayor Frank Jackson, Governor John Kasich and Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine among others.
DeWine called Voinovich a friend to him and his wife, and a political mentor…
“George Voinovich was a good and decent man, a leader, a statesman, a visionary. His mission in life was to serve others. In so doing he changed lives, and made this city, made this state, and made this country a far better place. Fran and I will miss him dearly.”
Voinovich lived his entire life in Cleveland, and though he was a Republican, he served as the predominantly Democratic city’s mayor from 1980 to 1989.