by Ariel Miller
Bear witness for fair districts: ask fellow Ohioans to vote Yes on Issue 1! The Diocese of Southern Ohio has endorsed Ohio Issue 1, the “Citizens Not Politicians” constitutional amendment to ban elected officials, party officials, and lobbyists from drawing our electoral districts. A huge signature collection campaign qualified Issue 1 for the ballot, but the ballot summary written by the Ohio Ballot Board misleads voters by claiming Issue 1 creates – not bans – gerrymandering. You can make a huge contribution by educating your community about how the amendment is designed to produce fair districts so voters can hold their legislators accountable. I’ll explain ways to do that below, but first:
Why should Episcopalians care about this arcane matter? Ohio’s current districts were drawn by elected officials, who have a built-in conflict of interest: preserving their power. As either party does when it can get away with it, the majority party created maps after the most recent census that gave themselves a veto-proof supermajority in both houses of the General Assembly.
The policies they are advancing appeal to primary voters (who determine the ultimate winner in a “safe” district) and to major lobbyists, but directly oppose the views of the majority of Ohio voters on curriculum about race, on gun safety, on burning fossil fuels, and on fracking. I’ve been reporting for four years on Ohio legislation that undermines major humanitarian priorities of The Episcopal Church, including:
- Diagnosing and healing the harms wrought by racism
- Reducing gun violence, and
- Mitigating climate change.
You can review General Convention resolutions on all of these issues through this link.
The Feb. 13 Advocacy Update on our diocesan website details the stark contrast between the General Assembly’s policy decisions and our diocesan Becoming Beloved Community work over the past six years. Here are just a few of the terrible milestones. After the murder of George Floyd, while our congregations were studying the history and ravages of racism through the Sacred Ground curriculum and delving into books like the Rev. Canon Stephanie Spellers’ The Church Cracked Open, our Ohio legislators were debating bills to shut down diversity and equity programs and to curtail teaching about racism and other “divisive content” like climate change.
Baldwin Wallace University’s 2022 Ohio Pulse Poll found that over 80% of Ohio parents and 69% of rural voters supported teaching about the history of race and racism and the impact of race and racism in the US. But the supporters of bills like SB 83 portray the teaching of this history as the danger to young minds, not racism. The Ohio Senate leadership bullied Ohio School Board members into rescinding their own 2020 resolution to overcome the harms caused by systemic racism revealed by a comprehensive study of Ohio public schools. The Legislature stripped the Ohio School Board of its authority over curriculum in 2023.
Framing this issue through the lens of the Episcopal Church’s Becoming Beloved Community work and the Episcopal baptismal vows, the Citizens Not Politicians forum for the Greater Cincinnati Festival of Faithssummarizes the dissonance between Ohio voters’ concerns and legislation passed by the Ohio General Assembly on education on race, gun safety and energy policy.
Gun violence is the leading cause of death for American children and teens. Ohio’s General Assembly has stripped away or weakened key gun safety laws. State law forbids local governments from passing stricter ordinances than the state’s. For example, cities can’t adopt safe storage laws to prevent suicides and the tragic deaths of children who find and play with guns in their homes.
As the climate crisis accelerated, our legislature has passed several laws favoring fossil fuel interests and creating obstacles to renewable energy in Ohio.
If you agree that gerrymandering insulates elected officials from accountability to voters’ concerns, and if you are worried about the impact of the policies our legislature is passing in defiance of Ohio voters’ views, please start speaking up about Issue 1 now, citing the moral commitments of our faith. Early voting begins Oct. 8.
Misinformation about Issue 1 is already pervasive, starting with the misleading ballot summary written by the Ohio Ballot Board. The ballot summary states the proposed Redistricting Commission “would be required to gerrymander” Ohio’s electoral maps – the very abuse Issue 1 is designed to prevent. Amendment supporters challenged the language before the Ohio Supreme Court, which largely upheld it on a 4-3 party line vote. Yard signs being distributed by Issue 1 opponents say “Stop Gerrymandering: No on Issue 1.”
Because the ballot language, ads, and “No on 1” yard signs mislead voters on this opportunity to restore accountability in our General Assembly and Congressional delegation, your voice as ethical, trusted members of your community can provide tremendous help to fellow voters. You can do this in many ways:
- Speak about Issue 1 to fellow parishioners, your neighbors, and your colleagues.
- Put out a yard sign.
- Hand out flyers during early voting at your Board of Elections.
- Write letters to the editor
- Request a Fair Districts speaker for your congregation or community, or
- Show the recording of the 50-minute forum I did about Issue 1 with Rae Vuic of the League of Women Voters for the Greater Cincinnati Festival of Faiths.
You can request flyers, bumper stickers, t-shirts, or postcards at this link.
Reporter Morgan Trau of News 5 Cleveland published an excellent summary of Issue 1 and the proponent and opponent campaigns. As she points out, “You will be voting on whether Ohio should remove politicians from the redistricting process. Currently, Ohio lawmakers draw the maps — ones that directly impact them and their colleagues. The Ohio Redistricting Commission (ORC) is made up of seven spots. Two will always go to Republicans and two to Democrats in the Statehouse. The three remaining seats include the governor, secretary of state and auditor.
“This led to the Ohio Redistricting Mess of 2022, where a bipartisan Ohio Supreme Court struck down seven different passed maps, citing that the GOP members of the commission were drawing lines to unfairly benefit their party.
“Voting yes on Issue 1 would create a 15-member Ohio Citizens Redistricting Commission (OCRC), made up of Republican, Democratic and independent citizens who broadly represent the different geographic areas and demographics of the state. It bans current or former politicians, political party officials, lobbyists and large political donors from sitting on the commission. It requires fair and impartial districts by making it unconstitutional to draw voting districts that discriminate against or favor any political party or individual politician. It also mandates the commission to operate under an open and independent process.
“A bipartisan screening panel of two Republican and two Democratic retired judges would choose the commissioners through an extensive application process. The commissioners would draw the maps based on federal law, also taking into account past election data on partisan preferences. The commission would make sure that each district has a reasonably equal population and that communities of interest are kept together.”
“Voting no on Issue 1 would be rejecting the independent commission proposal and keeping the current setup.”
Our diocese joins the Ohio Council of Churches, the League of Women Voters Ohio, the NAACP Ohio, and a host of other nonpartisan statewide groups in endorsing Issue 1. Email me with any questions! I’ve been reporting on redistricting for four years now as part of the diocesan Becoming Beloved Community team and would be happy to connect you to trustworthy information.
Early voting begins Oct. 8. Can you drop off an absentee ballot for someone else? Remember how important drop boxes were to voting safely during the pandemic? Since then, the Ohio Legislature passed HB 458 restricting ballot boxes to one location per county. The law further specifies that only close relatives – spouses, parents, in-laws, grandparents, the voter’s son, daughter, adopting parent, adopted child, stepparent, stepchild, sibling, uncle, aunt, nephew, or niece – can drop off a ballot for a voter. To vote in person, Ohioans must present a photo ID including unexpired state IDs or a US passport.
In August, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose issued an order that anyone returning a ballot for someone else would either have to mail the ballot or drop it off inside the Board of Elections, where they must sign a form attesting that they are legally doing so. Since this has to be done when the Board of Elections is open, this creates an obstacle for relatives who work during those hours. The alternative is to mail the ballot, which raises concerns about timely mail delivery.
The order is being challenged in a suit to the Ohio Supreme Court. The Cleveland Plain Dealer reports that the order is temporary, and that it will expire in December, after the general election.
