Sunday, January 31, 1999
Dems' infighting scotches strong-mayor plan
BY HOWARD WILKINSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Wednesday afternoon, in Cincinnati City Hall, we could feel the earth move beneath our feet.
Something happened that made one feel that, at any moment, the solid old building on Plum Street could start falling apart, one granite block at a time.
The five Democrats on Cincinnati City Council actually agreed on something.
You could tell by their signatures on the motion to enter the city into a lawsuit against handgun manufacturers that their hands might have quivered as they put pen to paper. But they did, and for the first time in memory the Democrats — who represent a majority on the nine-member council — were all on the same page.
Some denizens of City Hall saw this as a sign that the End Times are near; more optimistic souls believed this miraculous occurrence foretells the new Age of Aquarius.
Well, probably not.
They are Democrats, after all, bred, like roosters and certain canine breeds, to fight. And fight they will.
If you do not believe, you should have been at Integrity Hall in Bond Hill on Saturday morning, where about 100 Cincinnati Democratic precinct executives and a few dozen other interested Democrats to debate whether Cincinnati should change its form of government and elections.
At issue is the plan by Build Cincinnati, a group of young Democrats, Republicans and independents who have been working for more than a year on a plan that would radically change the government the city has had since the 1920s.
Build Cincinnati is an energetic group, but it has, at all times, been under adult supervision, with the county Democratic and Republican party chairmen and the president of the NAACP giving them their commission to devise a plan.
What they have come up with is a plan by which the mayor of the city would be elected in a separate race from council, after a partisan primary. The mayor would not be the ribbon-snipper and proclamation-giver we have grown accustomed to, but a political powerhouse who would be a “chief executive officer” with veto power.
Council, under this plan, would include three members elected at-large and eight elected from districts, which have yet to be drawn.
While individual Democrats have been involved in the drafting of this plan, Build Cincinnati needs the Democratic party four-square behind it if it has any chance of selling the plan to the public in an increasingly Democratic city.
In 1995, the Cincinnati Business Committee tried and failed to sell a ballot issue for a “strong mayor” form of government. It fell to pieces after it became clear that only the Republican Party wanted it and that nobody who carries a lunch bucket to work and isn't in on the company stock option plan was going to vote for it.
Build Cincinnati can't afford to have that happen again.
But the Cincinnati Democratic Committee, the group that met Saturday morning, is deeply divided over Build Cincinnati. Many in the party wonder what is in it for them.
After all, Democrats have done right well under the current system, thank you very much. They have dominated council in the 1990s; they have never lost the mayor's office under the “top vote-getter” system; and African-Americans, the party's largest constituency group, have elected four of their own in the last two council elections.
A lot of Democrats want to know what problem they are being asked to fix.
Saturday's meeting was the typical Democratic bedlam, with the various sides of the argument spitting nails at each other for two hours and, in the end, agreeing only that nothing would be done.
With their hopes of getting a plan on the ballot any time soon fading fast, the Build Cincinnati Democrats went home from Saturday's meeting with that age-old lament of Chicago Cubs' fans ringing in their ears:
Wait 'til next year.
Howard Wilkinson covers politics. His column appears Sundays. He can be reached at 768-8388 or e-mail at hwilkinson@enquirer.com
Howard Wilkinson covers politics for the Enquirer.
WILKINSON ARCHIVE
