New way to draw Ohio political maps on fall ballot

JULIE CARR SMYTH

AP State­house Correspondent

COLUMBUS — Ohio vot­ers next month will decide whether the state should move for­ward with a pro­posal to change the process for redraw­ing its polit­i­cal districts.

Debate over Issue 2 has been con­tentious. It pro­poses a 12-member com­mis­sion of state res­i­dents to re-draw Ohio’s leg­isla­tive and con­gres­sional maps every 10 years.

Cur­rently, the state Leg­is­la­ture draws the U.S. House dis­tricts, and the five-member state appor­tion­ment board draws leg­isla­tive dis­tricts. The gov­er­nor, sec­re­tary of state, audi­tor and two leg­isla­tive appointees make up the appor­tion­ment board.

There’s broad agree­ment that Ohio’s sys­tem needs repair, but con­sid­er­able dis­agree­ment about whether Issue 2 offers the right fix.

Vot­ers First, which sup­ports the plan, argues that there’s too much self-interest in the cur­rent process.

“This is a very sim­ple plan. It ends the cor­rupt sys­tem we have today that lets politi­cians design their own dis­tricts,” said Sandy Theis, a spokes­woman for the labor-backed coali­tion. “It will take that power away from them and give it to an inde­pen­dent cit­i­zens’ com­mis­sion that would have to do all its busi­ness in public.”

The first nine mem­bers of the com­mis­sion would be selected by lot­tery from 42 appli­cants placed into Repub­li­can, Demo­c­ra­tic and unaf­fil­i­ated pools by a panel of appeals court judges. The first nine mem­bers selected would pick the other three.

Pro­tect Your Vote Ohio, the oppo­si­tion cam­paign, says the lengthy con­sti­tu­tional amend­ment is rife with risky unknowns. It closely resem­bles a com­mis­sion that Cal­i­for­nia vot­ers approved in 2010.

“While you have a process (in Ohio) now that’s account­able to tax­pay­ers because it’s con­ducted by elected offi­cials, vot­ers would have no recourse in terms of hold­ing these com­mis­sion­ers account­able or for repeal­ing their deci­sions,” said spokesman Carlo LoParo.

Oppo­nents believe unaf­fil­i­ated com­mis­sion­ers would be par­tic­u­larly sus­cep­ti­ble to polit­i­cal pres­sure at map-drawing time. The Ohio State Bar Asso­ci­a­tion and Ohio Judi­cial Con­fer­ence oppose the issue out of con­cern that appel­late judges also would be vul­ner­a­ble to polit­i­cal pressure.

Theis said the con­cern is misplaced.

“There have been dozens of the state’s top legal and con­sti­tu­tional schol­ars who signed an open let­ter that explained that OSBA’s con­cerns are totally mis­guided,” she said. “They’ve done a great dis­ser­vice because they’ve entered the polit­i­cal arena and ped­dled inac­cu­rate information.”

The feud between the two sides has car­ried over to the Ohio Elec­tions Com­mis­sion and the state Bal­lot Board, pit­ting its largely Demo­c­ra­tic back­ers against largely Repub­li­can oppo­nents. Repub­li­cans have drawn Ohio’s U.S. House maps for 20 years, and its leg­isla­tive maps for 30.

Oppo­nents include the Ohio Repub­li­can Party, Ohio Cham­ber of Com­merce, Ohio Right to Life and state asso­ci­a­tions of CPAs, retail mer­chants, and farm­ers. Sup­port­ers include the League of Women Vot­ers, NAACP, Pro­gres­sO­hio, Ohio Cit­i­zen Action, Planned Par­ent­hood and the Ohio Coun­cil of Churches.

Another bal­lot issue, called Issue 1, asks vot­ers whether they’d like to call a con­ven­tion to “revise, alter, or amend” the Ohio Con­sti­tu­tion. Such a con­ven­tion would include dis­cus­sion of redis­trict­ing and term lim­its and a cleanup of exist­ing con­sti­tu­tional lan­guage, among other tasks.

The state’s gov­ern­ing doc­u­ment emerged from the state’s first con­sti­tu­tional con­ven­tion in Chill­i­cothe in 1802. It was revis­ited at con­ven­tions in 1851 and 1912.

Under state law, the ques­tion of a con­sti­tu­tional con­ven­tion comes before vot­ers every two decades. Four pre­vi­ous bal­lot issues call­ing for a con­ven­tion have been rejected. There has been no sig­nif­i­cant sup­port or oppo­si­tion cam­paign this year.

The map-drawing and con­sti­tu­tional con­ven­tion issues are on the Nov. 6 ballot.

Posted by AP News on Oct 8 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.