COLUMBUS — By the time Ohio has a presidential primary, probably in June, it would be too late for Ram Ridgeway to help his candidate, Herman Cain, win the Republican presidential nomination.

That’s not stopping Ridgeway, 29, of Fairborn, however.

Without personally visiting caucus-goers in Iowa or trudging through the snow in New Hampshire, Ridgeway is already organizing volunteers to run phone banks right here in the Dayton area to get the Cain message out to voters in the early caucus and primary states.

What Ridgeway calls the first “official” meeting of Miami Valley Cain volunteers is set for Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. at Capri Lanes in Kettering. Everybody’s supposed to pitch in $6 for pizza and soda, said Ridgeway.

He’s been working up to the kickoff.

“I started getting people involved in early October,” Ridgeway said.

Such volunteer efforts for presidential campaigns start up every four years; but Cain, former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza, seems to have caught the attention of Republican voters in a way similar to the effect Barack Obama had on Democrats four years ago.

“It’s likability,” said Ridgeway, a manager at a local credit union.

It even rubbed off on his wife, April, who voted for Obama in 2008, said Ridgeway.

“I’m not going to shun her for it,” Ridgeway said of the Obama support.

Despite recent sexual-harassment allegations from his time as head of the National Restaurant Association in the 1990s, Cain, 65, has zoomed to the top of the polls both nationally and in Ohio in the race for the GOP nomination.

“They’re nothing more than allegations,” said Ridgeway. “He’s never been charged with anything ... . We elected Bill Clinton twice.”

A national Quinnipiac University poll released last week showed Cain with 30 percent of the vote, followed by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney with 23 percent. An Oct. 26 Quinnipiac poll in Ohio also showed Cain ahead of Romney, 40-33 percent.

Of course, Cain’s likability comes with a conservative bent.

Before Cain got involved in the hunt for the 2012 nomination, he filled in occasionally on talk radio for Neal Boortz, said Ridgeway.

Usually when there are substitutes for Boortz, Rush Limbaugh or other high-profile hosts, “you really get bummed out,” Ridgeway said. “It was the opposite with Cain,” said Ridgeway. “It was, ‘take a day off, we could use Herman Cain.’ ”

Ridgeway said he thought to himself: “I wish this guy would run for president.”