Rich Ploch, Larry Powell are running for La Salle County coroner

The Democratic nomination for coroner is one of two contested primaries in La Salle County.

Democrats Rich Ploch, of Peru, a chief deputy of the coroner's office, will be contested in the Tuesday, March 17, primary by Dr. Lawrence Powell, of Ottawa, a retired physician. No Republicans have filed for candidacy.

Incumbent William Wujek is not seeking re-election.

While parties may have no candidates running in the primary, they still may appoint someone to run following the primary and prior to June 1 for the general election.

Richard Ploch

Richard Ploch said he brings experience to the table in his effort to become the next La Salle County coroner.

Ploch joined the coroner’s office in 2003 as a part-time deputy before being appointed to full-time years later.

“I’ve investigated literally thousands of cases for La Salle County,” Ploch said. “I have acquired experience through continued education, along with having a background in EMS. I’m a first responder with a background in social work and law enforcement. The coroner’s office is kind of a hybrid.”

Ploch said those experiences are needed to investigate death cases and his previous working relationships with law enforcement, state’s attorneys, families and funeral homes will be useful.

“We know it’s a rough time for families and we want to help loved ones through a tough time,” Ploch said.

Ploch said the opioid crisis is going to be at the forefront of his goals; he wants to continue partnerships with the health department and further reach out to local legislature and support groups to help create a solution. Further involvement, Ploch said, will help avoid an unfortunate end result.

“We want to help law enforcement and support groups understand what compounds and chemicals they’re working with,” Ploch said. “I want to continue that and help be an advocate for not only Narcan but see if we can get more support for people that are addicted, so they can get treatment at a reasonable cost.”

Ploch said the county took care of 1,342 decedents in 2018 and about 10% of those cases required an autopsy, which becomes expensive when the county doesn’t have it’s own morgue.

“I’m not saying it’ll happen now but I’d like to work with the board and see if it’s feasible in the future,” Ploch said. “It’ll save us money as we won’t have to worry about relying on a separate morgue.”

Ploch is a resident of Peru and has lived in La Salle County for his entire life.

“I think it helps to have someone that’s been in the office and people are familiar with,” Ploch said. “They can gravitate towards me and we can help with the process. Our job is to help the family work through what happened and provide a professional and well done investigation to answer their questions. We need to help people through. We’re speaking for the decedent, usually, so we need to help.”

Dr. Larry Powell

Dr. Larry Powell formerly worked for OSF St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Ottawa and St. Paul in Mendota before retiring a few years back; he cites his experience in medical work as his best qualification for coroner.

“I think both candidates will do an equal job but what makes me stand out is my breadth of experience from my background, being a physician, especially one in emergency medicine,” Powell said. “I’ve done a lot of medical legal work as well.”

Powell said he believes coroner is a job that requires a strong background in the medical side and he has experience in medical-legal work.

Powell said he was spurred to run by data he found on the La Salle County Coroner’s website that explained there have been 94 overdose deaths within the last three years, giving La Salle County an average of 23 deaths per 100,000, one of the highest rates in the state, according to countyhealthrankings.org.

“There needs to be more community work,” Powell said. “We need access to all of our providers and extended providers. We need a more regional approach to this in order to get this problem fixed.”

Powell believes even though the coroner deals mostly with death, prior intervention before death could be an important part of the job; he is concerned with La Salle County’s high number of overdoses and suicides and he wants to work towards solving these issues.

He also believes the lack of a county morgue causes issues and extra expenses because the county has to pay daily storage fees for some of the deceased.

Powell urges voters to view his Facebook page, Dr. Larry Powell, where he has a video explaining his ideas for what he would do as coroner.

“We need to get out there to make a change and we need a more coordinated effort,” Powell said. “People should vote for integrity, experience and transparency.”