Columbus needs a change
Re "Hybrid council gains support," Aug. 19: I listened to the entire city council hearing on Monday about district elections and the Our City, Our Say initiative
. Nothing showed me how out of touch our city council is more than contrasting the invited testimony from labor leaders with the testimony of two residents from Driving Park, one of whom was the chair of the Livingston Avenue Area Commission.The labor leaders clearly had inside information about the council's proposal being vetted behind closed doors. In contrast, the Driving Park neighbors had pointed charges for at least two councilmembers, who had not responded to their needs for years.
And even on Monday night,
they could not be bothered to respond to those charges in front of an audience and reporters.
Clearly, we need a change when our representatives eagerly recruit interest groups to weigh in on issues related to city representation, but can't be bothered to respond to an area commission leader or a resident in public.
For this reason, I believe deeply that the simple solution in the Our City, Our Say ballot issue will help us elect representatives that are accountable to us, not to their funders and developers.
Pari Sabety, Columbus
Ramaswamy doesn't get Ohio
Re "My data center plan will kill your electric bill," Aug. 6: Besides his strange fascination with data centers, Vivek Ramaswamy’s main policy proposal is a continuation of the relentless Republican shift of the tax burden away from millionaires onto everyone who works for a living.
Gov. John Kasich began this shift by abolishing Ohio’s estate tax and lowering corporate taxes to near zero. Income taxes have been systematically cut in every legislative session, and Ramaswamy says he will eliminate them altogether.
These cuts in the type of taxes that primarily affect the wealthy have been financed in two ways:
- Severe cuts in state services like public education and libraries, health care, rural hospitals, and first responders like firefighters and police.
- Increases in taxes paid primarily by working people like gasoline taxes, sales taxes and property taxes, all of which have been increased to levels that are unsustainable.
After nearly 16 years of these ill-advised Republican policies, it is abundantly clear that Ohio can’t afford Ramaswamy.
Lou Friscoe, Columbus
Our practices aren't best practices
Re "2 reform measures could be on ballot," Aug. 16: In drafting proposed changes to the structure of Columbus City Council, city officials need to do better than last time.
When a charter review committee was announced in July 2016, Mayor Andrew Ginther and Council President Shannon Hardin said it would study "best practices" of city councils throughout the U.S. After the committee worked for 10 months to propose changes to the method of electing council members, city officials considered the proposal for months before placing it on the May 2018 ballot.
The final version looked nothing like best practices of councils in other cities. As Columbus Monthly reported in October 2023, it was "novel" and a "unique electoral method that no other city in Ohio uses and is rarely seen elsewhere in the U.S."
After the highly unusual system was in effect for less than three years, Council President Pro Tempore Rob Dorans, who wasn't on council when the system was adopted, called it "confusing" and "stupid and wacky." Numerous citizens agree.
With city officials producing those results after almost two years of study, it's not comforting to know that some of the same people are drafting a new proposal with only weeks or less to do it.
Perhaps they already deserve to be told "thanks, but no thanks." Voters can support a sensible proposal for council reform placed on November's ballot by an initiative petition having more than 23,000 signatures.
Joseph Sommer, Columbus
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: It's our city. We should say who leads it, not special interest groups | Letters
