is anyone else having issues with the most local toons not being selected for fights in heist?
What do you mean as most local? Each time you play Heist some characters can’t participate, and that always includes one or some meta ones.
Oh, sorry, misunderstanding. Yes, sometimes the game prefers those who are far away, which is weird.
I think this happens when the near (or local) heroes are already „in a fight“. They’re not fighting, but a fight is already ongoing to which they could be called. So when there’s a fight running where they could be called, heroes can’t be called to another fight.
Define local buddy, what’s local to one might be foreign to another 
i generally dont heist in public as people ruin it by removing toons from gems and failing alot etc so i have a few guildmates that go on at certain times and heist so we all know how each other plays etc, so since the new heist came into play with red blobs etc we have noticed that when we are using 2 or 3 toons to fight the red blobs they always travel together and when we attempt to fight an assisted fight the other toons that have been travelling with us and are sat right next to the assisted fight do not get selected but other toons which are far away (passed 3 or 4 diamond guarders enroute)