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Times Tribune April 25, 2023

Contact the writer: dsingleton@timesshamrock.com, 570-348-9132

A two-term incumbent and a former county prosecutor will meet in Lackawanna County’s only contested judicial race in the May 16 primary election.

Paul J. Ware and Mariclare Lawless Hayes are running for the magisterial district judge seat that Ware has occupied since 2012.

District 45-1-06, one of 10 magisterial jurisdictions in the county, encompasses Dunmore and the North Scranton and Green Ridge sections of Scranton.

Both candidates crossfiled and seek the Democratic and Republican nominations. The winner on each side will appear on the general election ballot in November.

Ware, 56, a Dunmore resident, seeks his third six-year term on the bench. The 43-year-old Hayes, a Green Ridge resident, is making her first run for office.

Ware said he is proud of the work his office does and believes his performance over the past 12 years demonstrates his commitment to the job. The Dunmore-based district is one of the busiest in the state, handling over 4,500 cases a year effectively and productively, he said.

Ware said he hopes voters will agree his work has earned him re-election, and stressed that experience is the most important issue in the race.

Nothing beats experience, “and I’ve been doing it for 12 years,” he said.

“As anyone who has even been in front of me knows, most people don’t complain,” Ware said. 

“They are glad they have the opportunity to be heard, and I know most, if not all of them, think they have been treated fairly.

“That is really what you are looking for in a magistrate — someone experienced, someone competent, someone fair.”

Hayes, who was a county deputy district attorney for more than a decade and now works as an assistant city solicitor for Scranton, where she handles code enforcement issues, said she is coming into the race “as a whole person.”

“Of course, I bring my own experience, but I also bring my character and integrity and my personal motivation to serve this community,” Hayes said.

She said the decision to join the race is not something she rushed into blindly. After looking at numbers from the county’s primary election in 2021, when Ware unsuccessfully sought nomination for a county judgeship, the contest appeared winnable, she said.

“Aside from that, this is something I have thought about for a long time,” Hayes said. “The timing was right for our family.”

Both candidates talked about the role magisterial district judges play in protecting their communities, and both indicated it needs to be a priority.

Although the magistrate is the first stop for criminal cases, it also addresses neighborhood concerns, everything from landlord-tenant issues to minor civil matters, Ware said.

“Safety is paramount, quality of life is close and we have to make sure our children are protected,” he said. “I don’t mean just protected from others. I mean protected from themselves, too. Sometimes a harmless indiscretion doesn’t deserve to have a criminal record that follows you for the rest of your life.”

Hayes, who says she is proud of everything she has done in her career but described her time as a county prosecutor as the most challenging and rewarding, said the district judge is the “first line of defense” for the community, whether that’s on crime or quality-of-life issues.

She said she thinks what concerns voters in the district is maintaining the integrity of their neighborhoods in terms of safety as well as in terms of beauty, and her background on both of those fronts runs deep, she said.

“That call to public service that drove me to be a prosecutor for 10½ years is the same call that is drawing me to this role,” she said.

Magisterial district judges in Pennsylvania earn an annual salary in 2023 of $106,254.