What Frankart said under oath

TIFFIN — When the Seneca County Commissioners' office described Bill Frankart's May 2024 deposition as a battle he endured with "typical wisdom and strength," it did not describe what he said under oath inside that conference room. According to the deposition transcript, obtained by the Advertiser-Tribune through a records request to the Ottawa-Sandusky-Seneca Joint Solid Waste Management District, Frankart acknowledged over more than six hours of questioning by WIN Waste's legal team that public statements he had made, including signed testimony submitted to the Ohio Senate, were false. He said he had taken no action to correct them. The Advertiser-Tribune began reporting this story on April 29 after receiving information about the deposition. The same day, the newspaper submitted a records request for the transcript and received the document. Questions were submitted to Frankart and to WIN Waste the same day with a Friday, May 1 deadline for responses. The deposition was taken May 28, 2024, in WIN Waste Innovations of Seneca County LLC v. Ottawa-Sandusky-Seneca Joint County Solid Waste Management District, a lawsuit filed by WIN Waste in Sandusky County Common Pleas Court in December 2023. Frankart was also among the named defendants in a separate federal case filed by WIN Waste, which was dismissed with prejudice in September 2025. The Republican primary in which Frankart seeks another term as Seneca County Commissioner is Tuesday. 'None. None.' That was Frankart's answer, according to the deposition transcript, when asked what he had done to correct a quote he gave the Columbus Dispatch claiming Seneca County was outvoted "2 to 1" on OSS oversight decisions. Under oath, he acknowledged the statement had not been true during his tenure on the OSS board. Asked the same question about testimony he submitted to the Ohio Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee in support of Senate Bill 119, a bill he had championed that would have allowed Seneca County to unilaterally withdraw from OSS, Frankart said: "No action at this point." Asked repeatedly across multiple exchanges whether he would commit to correcting the record going forward, Frankart said each time he would refer to counsel. The framework According to the deposition transcript, before any exhibits were introduced, WIN Waste's lead counsel Nathan Leber of Squire Patton Boggs walked Frankart through a series of foundational questions that Frankart answered yes to on the record. As a county commissioner, Frankart agreed, public statements should be accurate and supported by facts. If he later learned a public statement was false, he had an obligation to notify the public. He agreed it was unfair to constituents to spread wrong information without later correcting it. Subsequent admissions in the deposition were measured against those answers. The withdrawal process The legislative push to allow Seneca County to leave OSS, which began with SB 119 in May 2023 and culminated in SB 147 taking effect in September 2025, played out over more than two years. In November 2024, the Seneca County commissioners voted unanimously to request a withdrawal from OSS, citing their belief that solid waste disposal fees generated in Seneca County should be used to address solid waste issues in Seneca County. Under state law in effect at the time, all member counties had to agree before any county could leave a joint solid waste district. Ottawa County commissioners voted to deny the request on January 9, 2025. Sandusky County commissioners voted to deny it on January 14, 2025. Either denial was sufficient to block the withdrawal. The three counties remained in OSS. Senate Bill 147 changed the framework. The legislation allowed a county that hosts solid waste facilities collectively paying more than 75% of a joint district's annual revenue to initiate a unilateral withdrawal, without requiring approval from the other member counties. Through the host community fee paid by WIN Waste, Seneca County met that threshold. SB 147 passed the Ohio Senate on April 9, 2025, by a vote of 33-0 and the Ohio House on June 11, 2025, by a vote of 90-2. The legislation took effect September 30, 2025. Following SB 147's passage, the Seneca County commissioners voted unanimously on October 28, 2025, to formally request withdrawal under the new law. The vote initiated a two-year transition period during which the three counties continue to operate jointly under a memorandum of understanding while Seneca County establishes its own district. On March 11, 2026, the commissioners passed a resolution officially establishing the Seneca County Solid Waste Management District. The final separation from OSS is expected to be completed in late 2027. The 2-to-1 claim The first exhibit introduced at the deposition was a June 13, 2023, Columbus Dispatch article quoting Frankart saying it was "a 2 to 1 vote whenever we ask for more oversight" at OSS. Leber asked whether the statement was false. Frankart initially gave a longer answer about how OSS often resolved disputes through committee discussions before formal votes. After Leber pressed him three times, Frankart agreed the statement was false. He testified that during his tenure on the OSS board, Seneca County had not been outvoted 2-to-1 by the other member counties. A similar claim appeared in testimony submitted to the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee on May 23, 2023. The testimony, authored by Commissioner Anthony Paradiso on behalf of the Seneca County Board of Commissioners, stated Seneca County was "outvoted on decisions that directly impact our community." Frankart confirmed in his deposition that he had signed the testimony. Leber asked whether that public statement, as it appeared in the testimony, was false. "Yes," Frankart said. Ottawa County Commissioner Mark Coppeler, who was chair of the OSS board at the time, told the Ohio House Energy and Natural Resources Committee on October 25, 2023, that the information presented by Seneca County commissioners was "not entirely factual" and that he could not recall a single instance in seven years on the board where OSS had voted against Seneca County or failed to vote unanimously. Coppeler's testimony also stated that at an August 2, 2023, OSS Solid Waste District meeting, months before Frankart's October 2023 and May 2024 testimonies repeating similar claims, both Paradiso and Frankart had acknowledged the inaccuracy of their public statements. According to Coppeler, Paradiso "said that he may have misspoken in saying that Seneca County is outvoted by the other two counties," and "agrees that Seneca County has never been outvoted in any OSS Solid Waste District votes in the past." On Frankart's "2 to 1 vote" claim, Coppeler's testimony stated Frankart acknowledged that when Seneca County commissioners asked the OSS board for additional funds for landfill oversight, the OSS board "did help in providing that funding." According to the deposition transcript, Frankart agreed Coppeler's account was accurate as to his own tenure. Asked whether it bothered him that Coppeler had publicly accused him of making false accusations, Frankart said he was "not really" bothered. The history of noncompliance A May 30, 2023, Senate testimony submitted by the Seneca County Board of Commissioners, an October 9, 2023, House testimony signed by all three Seneca County commissioners, and a May 1, 2024, House testimony submitted by Frankart alone all told the legislature the landfill had a "history of noncompliance," a failure to meet the standards of the Federal Clean Air Act and "numerous notices of violations from the Ohio EPA." The October 2023 and May 2024 versions described the Clean Air Act failure as "documented." The May 1, 2024, testimony, which carried Frankart's name alone, was submitted 27 days before his deposition. According to the deposition transcript, Leber asked Frankart to name an example of noncompliance from 2023, 2022, 2021 or 2020. He could not name one for any year. Asked what specific Clean Air Act violations he had been referring to in the testimony, Frankart said he did not have those available at the deposition. He also acknowledged he had not included any information about WIN Waste's compliance record in the testimony. Asked directly whether he had condensed out information that might have been positive for the landfill while including information he interpreted as negative, Frankart did not directly answer, saying instead that the commissioners had put together the testimony to support their argument for more oversight. The health claims Frankart's legislative testimony referenced the landfill's effect on residents. His April 2025 SB 147 testimony cited "fears over the landfill's potential impact on their physical and mental health." His earlier SB 119 testimonies referenced the "documented failure" to meet federal air standards. According to the deposition transcript, Leber asked whether Frankart was aware of the Jerome air monitors at the landfill site, which Leber said take hydrogen sulfide readings every 10 minutes from five locations along the fence line. Frankart said he was unaware of any monitoring at the site. Asked whether he was aware of any regulatory action level for hydrogen sulfide, including the 15 to 20 parts per billion levels Leber said are used by the Ohio EPA, Frankart said he was unaware. Asked whether he had any facts that the landfill was causing chemicals to be in the air above any regulatory health-based limit, Frankart said: "No, sir, because we're not the oversight authority." Asked whether he had any facts that the planned expansion would cause chemicals to exceed health-based limits, Frankart again referred to oversight authority resting elsewhere. Leber represented on the record that 99.9% of samples from the Jerome monitors showed hydrogen sulfide levels below the 15 parts per billion regulatory action level, and that the action level applied at the WIN Waste landfill is lower than at any other landfill in the state. Frankart did not dispute the figures. The railcar display According to the deposition transcript, Frankart and a colleague displayed photographs of damaged railcars at a public setup in Fostoria, presenting them as evidence of issues at the landfill. Frankart had taken the photos on January 10, 2024. According to the deposition transcript, when Leber asked about a railcar Frankart had photographed, Frankart said the car had a green tag on it. He initially said he did not know what the tags meant. After Leber pointed out that Frankart had himself raised the green tag in response to a question about repairs, Frankart confirmed the tag indicated the car needed repairs and that he knew that before he showed the photos publicly. He did not disclose the green tag to the public who saw the display. Leber also represented to Frankart on the record that the Seneca County Health Department had tested the contents of that car and found nothing hazardous. Frankart said he was aware that the health department had tested some cars but was not sure which. He agreed it was important for the public to know whether the contents of the car were safe. Asked whether he would commit to issuing a public clarification about the testing results, Frankart said he would consult counsel. Ten months after the deposition, Frankart's April 2025 testimony in support of Senate Bill 147, the successor legislation that ultimately passed, again described waste-filled railcars near residents' homes, "many with holes and exposed waste." What changed and what didn't The SB 147 testimony did not include some of the specific claims Frankart had said under oath were false or unsupported. The 2-to-1 vote claim was not in it. The "history of noncompliance" language was not in it. The Clean Air Act claim was not in it. The railcar imagery remained, as did references to potential health impacts on residents. The litigation sequence Frankart's deposition concluded May 28, 2024. The following day, WIN Waste withdrew its motion for a preliminary injunction in the case, according to court records. On September 12, 2024, 107 days after the deposition, WIN Waste voluntarily dismissed the Sandusky County lawsuit without prejudice. A separate federal case, WIN Waste Innovations of Seneca County LLC v. Coppeler et al., filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, was dismissed with prejudice on September 2, 2025, by stipulation of the parties, according to court records. Frankart was among the named defendants. In a written response to the Advertiser-Tribune, WIN Waste said the case was resolved through a settlement with OSS. WIN Waste also said that in 2025, it paid $2.8 million to the Seneca County General Health District, $2.03 million to the Ohio EPA and $1.9 million to OSS. The 2025 figures show a substantially higher local distribution than the figure in Frankart's May 30, 2023, Senate testimony in support of SB 119, which told the Ohio Senate that less than 29.4% of fees from the facility remained in the local community based on 2022 data. WIN Waste did not provide underlying inspection reports or air monitoring data in response to the Advertiser-Tribune's request. The company said reporters were welcome to visit the landfill to review the records in person. Asked for a response to the legislative testimony characterizing the landfill as having a "history of noncompliance" and "documented failures," WIN Waste said: "The only relevant history here is Commissioner Frankart's history of making false and misleading statements." WIN Waste also pointed to additional deposition exchanges. The company said Frankart was unaware that between 2021 and 2023 there had been 180 inspections of the landfill conducted by the Ohio EPA and the Seneca County Board of Health, with no enforcement actions resulting. According to the deposition transcript, when asked whether he could name a single fact showing the landfill was causing harm to human health in Seneca County, Frankart responded: "That I cannot, no, I cannot." The company said the Ohio EPA conducted six inspections of the landfill in March 2026 and found no violations. WIN Waste declined to comment on whether it has any ongoing or anticipated legal or regulatory actions related to the matters described in the deposition. Frankart's response The Advertiser-Tribune submitted questions to Frankart on April 29 with a deadline of Friday, May 1, at 5 p.m. The questions, based on the sworn deposition transcript and on signed legislative testimony submitted under his name, asked Frankart to respond to specific admissions in the deposition, to explain the factual basis for claims in his legislative testimony and to address whether the deposition is relevant information for voters ahead of the May 5 primary. The questions were sent to Frankart and were copied to Seneca County Clerk Cheyanne Heyman as a procedural safeguard. A response from Heyman's county email, on Frankart's behalf, arrived Friday and did not answer the questions. The response said: "In order to answer your questions thoroughly, we have to do our due diligence to ensure our information is correct and up to date. We cannot ensure that we have accurate information by your deadline. We will circle back in the near future." Heyman wrote that Frankart was out of the office. The day-after press release On May 29, 2024, the day after the deposition and the same day WIN Waste withdrew its motion for a preliminary injunction, the Seneca County Commissioners' office published a piece on the county website describing Frankart as having handled the proceedings with "typical wisdom and strength" after being "pushed onto the battlefield" by WIN Waste's legal team. The piece quoted Frankart saying "I took a hit for the constituents, and I'll do it every day." The piece, titled "Resilient in Battle: Commissioner Bill Frankart endures seven-hour WIN Waste deposition," was written by then-Seneca County Media Relations Coordinator Sheri Trusty. According to the deposition transcript, Trusty was listed as present at the deposition in her official county capacity. The piece she published the next day did not address what Frankart had said under oath.