DRAW THE COMPROMISE - HOUSE DEMOCRATS SHOULD SAY 'YES' TO JON HUSTED. HE WANTS TO GET MOVING ON A PLAN TO IMPROVE REDISTRICTING

Akron Beacon Journal
March 1, 2010

State Sen. Jon Husted isn't giving up on redistricting reform. Neither should the Ohio House, which on Feb. 1 proposed a complicated plan for devising better legislative districts. The filing deadline for placing the necessary constitutional amendment on the May 4 ballot? That came Feb. 3, too cramped a time frame for compromise. Husted, a Kettering Republican now running for secretary of state, put together a simpler, yet effective, approach last year. It passed the Senate in September.

There is still time to fix the ways legislative and congressional boundaries are drawn in Ohio, both highly partisan processes triggered by a new census count. Another deadline looms, Aug. 4, for the legislature to act to place an amendment on the November ballot. Husted has asked the House to act by early this month, allowing time to bridge differences.
Without action, legislative and congressional lines will be reshaped to gain partisan advantage, contributing to the gridlock in Columbus and Washington. Getting elected from a safe seat provides little incentive for compromise; rather, those elected from strongly Republican or Democratic bastions pay most attention to the ideologues of their own party.
In a recent letter to state Rep. Tom Letson, the Warren Democrat who authored the House plan, Husted discussed the key differences between the House and Senate versions, providing a roadmap to move ahead. To be sure, getting the Republican-led Senate and the Democratic-led House to act as the November elections approach will be difficult, as each calculates its prospects. Husted deserves credit for a thoughtful effort at trying.
He correctly urges the House to include congressional districts. Letson's plan addresses only legislative districts, which would leave congressional lines in the hands of the legislature. Why not improved congressional districts, too?
Letson would maintain the current apportionment board for drawing legislative lines rather than a seven-member bipartisan commission proposed by Husted, a supermajority needed for final action. The apportionment board, made up of the governor, auditor, secretary of state and a legislative member from each party, has long succumbed to partisan impulses. Control of two of the statewide offices is all that's needed to take command.
Finally, Husted urged more careful examination of two of the complex features of the Letson plan. One is a rigid system of scoring maps based on standards for representational fairness (overall partisan balance), political competitiveness, preservation of municipal boundaries and compactness. (Husted would require his commission to consider political competitiveness.) The other Letson idea calls for a bipartisan panel of retired judges to handle appeals. Both are fraught with legal and practical difficulties.
Husted's plan, with its reliance on a bipartisan commission rather than a scoring competition, is the better framework for discussions. The overriding goal is more districts with robust competition, the winners more likely to seek bipartisan solutions.