Hamilton County’s Democratic Party will be led by women for the first time ever after a Saturday morning vote to elect new leadership. The county’s 258 Democratic Party precinct chairs chose to make former state Rep. Connie Pillich and Springfield Township Trustee Gwen McFarlin co-chairs of the party. The two replace retiring chair Tim Burke, who has served in the role for 25 years. Precinct chairs also elected new faces to the party’s nine-member executive committee. Party members have touted that body’s diversity — it includes four black members and five women.

Pillich and McFarlin’s elections come as Democrats gain more clout in Hamilton County — more Democrats than Republicans turned out for the May primary in the county, and Democrats now hold a 2-1 majority on the Hamilton County Commission after the 2017 elections.

Pillich, who served in the Ohio House from 2009 to 2014, ran for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination last year, but dropped out of a crowded field earlier this year. McFarlin has been a Springfield Township Trustee for 23 years and is also the head of the Hamilton County Tax Levy Review Committee.

“Hamilton County is on the cusp of something great,” Pillich said. “It might not be easy. It might be bumpy, but Hamilton County is going to be blue.”