Editorial: State Issue 1 deserves support

Ohio voters have the chance to at least begin to fix the ugly process currently used to draw political lines in the state, and we believe they should take it.

State Issue 1 calls for a new process of handling redistricting of Ohio House and Senate boundaries in an effort to cut back on the gerrymandering that has taken place for many years. It does not, unfortunately, address how Congressional lines are drawn; some of those districts’ boundaries are flat-out ridiculous. But it’s a start.

The beauty of the system proposed by State Issue 1 is that it requires bipartisan support. It creates a seven-person commission that includes the governor, auditor and secretary of state, as well as four members appointed by the majority and minority leaders of the two houses.

If that commission were being formed today, it would have five Republicans and two Democrats. Any plan created must get at least four votes — but one of those votes would have to come from the minority party for the plan to stay in place for a decade.

The plan isn’t perfect, though. If the majority party decides to be stubborn, it can pass a plan with a simple majority, but that plan would only be in effect for four years, and the commission would reconvene. It could keep doing that, and thus maintain a stranglehold on the process, for as long as it is in power. We would hope that the party in the majority wouldn’t take it to that extreme, but anything is possible in politics.

It’s still better than what we have today. The current board is five members; the governor, auditor and secretary of state, and appointees from each of the two major political parties. That means four members of one party today, and does not require approval from the minority party’s vote on the commission. In short, it allows one party to draw the lines with no regard for the other party. It allows the party in control to create a significant number of districts that aren’t competitive at all because they can lump all of their own party together, and the districts can also be used to minimize the other parties’ top candidates’ chances of getting elected.

It’s not only unfair to the party currently in the minority, it’s unfair to voters of both parties. It hurts those who are voting in the minority for obvious reasons, but we would argue even those voters whose favored party has control also suffer. It results in legislators who have no real need or desire to appeal to voters of the other party; they know their only challenges will come from within their own parties, so as long as they don’t upset their establishments, they have no cause to worry.

Of course, the state legislative districts have term limits, anyway, but how often have we seen representatives and senators simply switch offices every eight years?

One last thing about Issue 1 that we like; it would strive to avoid splitting counties and townships in two. In some cases, we’re sure, that will be unavoidable, but we believe the system works best when cities, counties and townships aren’t split by those political boundaries.

For all those reasons, we encourage voters to support State Issue 1 on election day.