Cuyahoga County "Reform" on the Move

I just wanted to bring everyone up to speed on the attempts being made to alter Cuyahoga County's system of government, which I've written about previously. As expected, the plan formulated in private by a handful of the county's elite — now dubbed "New Cuyahoga Now" — is on the November ballot as Issue 6. The plan supported by county commissioners Peter Lawson Jones and Tim Hagan to convene a charter commission to hold public hearings and come up with a plan based on citizen input to be voted on next November — now dubbed "Real Reform Done Right" — is on the ballot as Issue 5.

While New Cuyahoga Now proponents boast about the number of signatures they got, compared to those Real Reform Done Right got, NCN spent a lot of money and hired paid petitioners while RRDR relied on volunteers. In any case, both were certified, setting up another drama: which would be first on the ballot, generally thought to be an advantage in garnering votes. The Cuyahoga County Board of Elections split along party lines, with the Republican members favoring NCN and the Democrats going with RRDR. That says pretty much what you'd think it does about who will benefit from each measure - and no, the presence of a couple of Democrats whose self-interest is more powerful than their party ties doesn't make NCN notably "bipartisan." (Neither does the presence of a couple of Republicans on their proposed charter commission lineup make RRDR significantly "bipartisan" either, although the commission members if elected will only initiate a public process in which anyone can participate - and commissioner Peter Lawson Jones says that when the slate was formed, they reached out to several additional Republicans who declined to participate.).

Subsequently, Secretary of State Jennifer broke the tie, based on previous decisions — since apparently no clear law exists in this area — that whichever issue is certified first gets the first slot.

This sets up several possible scenarios for November, including that both could pass — creating a potentially chaotic situation where the current system could be blown up and expensively and time-consumingly replaced, only to be blown up again the following November by the charter commission proposal. Or one or the other could be declared by courts — since lawsuits would inevitably ensue — to be the winner.

If both fail, that would leave us with the governance structure we have now - and force county citizens to deal with the real problem, which isn't the structure of county government but some of the officials in it.