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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.
Scott Elliott is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He writes about education, city and suburban issues, politics, business, workforce and consumer issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2010 > August > 05 > Entry
Editorial: Legislature’s flop on districting just ludicrous
The arguments that leading Ohio legislators make for continuing to allow one-party domination of the drawing of legislative districts are striking.
Take Senate Democratic leader Capri Cafaro, of Hubbard, speaking after hopes died this week for a bipartisan, House-Senate compromise reform measure.
“The concern of our caucus,” she said, “was not the content of the plan, but rather the concept of putting something into the constitution that hasn’t been tried in another state.”
In fact, though, the only way to change the map-drawing process is through the constitution. So Sen. Cafaro is saying Ohio should not be a national leader.
And, anyway, the compromise that she finally rejected did not have the truly bold, innovative idea that the (Democratic) House had passed. Its fundamental measure held simply that no future map may be adopted without bipartisan support.
The compromise did also instruct the map-drawers to try to create many districts that might be won either political party; and, given that some other districts must inevitably be dominated by one party, the map should have roughly equal numbers of Republican and Democratic districts, reflecting the political nature of the state.
That’s not much to be afraid of.
Or take the criticism by Sen. Bill Seitz, R-Cincinnati. For technical reasons, the compromise also included language that would give the mapmakers more leeway to break up townships and counties than cities. This was a compromise Sen. Husted had to agree to because Democratic techies had concluded that competitiveness and statewide balance between Republican and Democratic districts could not be achieved otherwise.
Sen. Seitz said, “I think this would work mischief.”
State Sen. Tim Grendell, R-Chesterland, said that the compromise could hurt rural Republicans.
Mischief? Any mischief in the context of a system that requires bipartisan votes and specific nonpartisan criteria would be tiny compared to mischief under the current system, which will now be in place for another decade. Now, the party that has two of three offices — governor, state auditor and secretary of state — is simply in charge. “Mischief” does not begin to cover what it can do.
The failure of reform is absurd, like something out of Alice in Wonderland. Support for reform came mainly from the House Democrats and Senate Republicans. What possible sense does that make?
Sen. Fred Strahorn, D-Dayton, expressed only the vaguest concerns about the compromise measure, saying he hadn’t quite focused on it. He said earlier versions worried him because of the nature of the tie-breaking mechanism, if maps couldn’t be agreed upon (something that the compromisers addressed).
The truth is unavoidable: The Senate Democrats associated reform with Sen. Husted and had no interest in helping his campaign for secretary of state by allowing him to claim an achievement. They provided not a single vote at any stage, though several expressed support for the general idea of reform.
And yet there’s blame to go around. The House Democrats who pushed reform did so belatedly, resulting in a special legislative session being required.
Even the most enthusiastic supporters deserve blame for not working on the Senate Democrats, whose numbers are so small (12 out of the 33 members), they frequently get ignored. But when a super-majority is necessary, as in this case, they can be crucial. Throughout this fight, they seemed to be on an island all to themselves.
The trip toward passage was always sharply uphill. Legislators were being asked to change rules that had worked for them, as individuals. Enthusiasm was always limited to a few, as was understanding of the issue.
The ending was sad.
But the issue has achieved higher visibility than ever. The next redistricting commission will include the next secretary of state. Both candidates — Sen. Husted and Maryellen O’Shaughnessy, the Democratic — are committed to reform. They can behave in that spirit on the commission, rather than as partisans, the way all other members have in past decades.
That could change things. But, still, the path is sharply uphill.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Post your comment | Categories: Editorials, Martin Gottlieb, Ohio government, Ohio politics
Comments
By Carol
August 5, 2010 7:07 PM | Link to this
Why should we expect bi-partisanship from our elected leaders. Very few have the character or integrity to govern in the best interest of those who elected them. This is true not only at the State level but also on the County, for example, look at the indignation Sheriff Plummer looks upon the County Commissioners through his speeches about how they are cutting his budget and don’t care about public safety. City officials don’t cooperate with each other, just look at the Clayton-Englewood debacle. If we want true reform from our Elected leaders then we need to replace everyone of them in 2010 and 2012.
By Dave
August 6, 2010 7:04 AM | Link to this
So if my party has an advantage in the way districts are drawn and the demographics say that should change, I could just say “no” and the advantage would stay mine. That’s not right, but it is how the game is played in this day and age.
By Skeptic
August 6, 2010 8:48 AM | Link to this
This is a huge FAIL on the part of the State legislators. I am extremely disappointed. Anyone who was not on board with this is useless in my book and will lose my vote in November.