Panel changes new Ohio redistricting plan

Associated Press

COLUMBUS,

A state panel charged with drawing Ohio’s new legislative districts voted unanimously Friday to restore portions of a historically black state Senate district in Cleveland to address what the leader of the legislative Black Caucus said were civil-rights concerns over boundaries approved earlier this week.

The state Apportionment Board voted 4-0 at an emergency meeting on the change requested by state Rep. Sandra Williams, who heads the Ohio Legislative Black Caucus.

Williams said she lobbied House Speaker Bill Batchelder for the changes on her own, not at the behest of the caucus. She said the caucus never discussed the issue.

The changes place two Ohio House districts on Cleveland’s west side back into Senate District 21, making its voters more than 35 percent black, and places some east-side suburbs back in District 25.

Republican Gov. John Kasich, who chairs the board, said the meeting had to be held hastily to meet a Saturday deadline.

Williams’ suggested changes were up before the panel on Wednesday, when it was thought the board had concluded its work. But House Minority Leader Armond Budish, the map-drawing panel’s sole Democratic member, said he didn’t believe the amendment reflected Williams’ wishes and so they were dropped and a final map was approved without them.

Budish missed Friday’s meeting because of a religious holiday.

Both the state senators whose districts were affected by Williams’ proposal — black Democrats Shirley Smith and Nina Turner — criticized the changes.

Turner said the changes “slice and dice communities” and misalign politics and economics.

“The communities in northeast Ohio should be insulted that those in control of this process reduced the kaleidoscope of our viewpoints and beliefs down to the color of our skin, ignoring the distinct needs, challenges and opportunities within individual communities,” she said in a statement. “This is an affront to all Ohioans who are looking to their leaders to create jobs and move our economy forward, not secure jobs for themselves at the Capitol.”

Smith, who represents the district Williams sought to protect, complained that Williams neither consulted her nor returned her phone calls before making the change. She said the lines were drawn so that Williams could seek Smith’s seat when she is forced out by term limits.

Williams said Senate District 25, currently held by Turner, has been represented by both blacks and whites over the years but District 21 was specifically carved out in 1967 to provide a voice for Cleveland blacks in the state Legislature.

“Legislators, both Republicans and Democrats, carved this district for both a city of Cleveland representative and for an African American representative,” Williams said after Friday’s vote. “And I think if we mess that up we are destroying a legacy that has been given to us by our forefathers, and I just don’t think we should do that.”

Legislators re-drawing Ohio Senate districts in the once-a-decade process faced a conundrum in Cleveland because they needed to protect African-American representation under the Voting Rights Act while grappling with significant population loss in the city.

Williams said she may indeed run for the District 21 seat once her time in the Ohio House is exhausted.

“I know for a fact that there are about four or five people who are planning on running for the state Senate, and I know that nothing is a guarantee for me,” she said. “What’s most important to me, as you will always realize, is that I look to the past to look what has been done for us, to try to pave the way for us to come along, and to try to make sure we maintain it as we go along.”

She said she will try to reunite the caucus once the dust settles.

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Online:

Reshape Ohio: http://www.sos.state.oh.us/SOS/ReshapeOhio.aspx