NEWS BULLETIN! NEWS BULLETIN! The Greater Cleveland Partnership backs the County Reform for an executive and 11-member Council that it gave $100,000 to put on the ballot.
What strange behavior. Supporting something you paid $100,000 to birth. Startling.
Well, the Plain Dealer today thought it was news. The Pee Dee ran a four-column headline, “Business group backs county reform plan” on the Metro front page. Since the Partnership paid for the ballot issue you’d have to believe that the “business group” – or Republican group, if you will – wants it.
The Pee Dee wants this reform badly. Really badly. Awfully badly.
The problem is that it appears more a plan to elect some Republicans than a well thought out reform plan.
And even worse it makes the County Prosecutor about the only present office holder to retain a position for election. The engineer, treasurer, auditor, coroner and sheriff will disappear as elected offices. That’s a big wipeout.
What that suggests to me is that the County Prosecutor – Bill Mason – will have pretty much all the power over justice in the County. Mason also, as a political power, will have a lot to say politically about who gets to run for the County executive. As it is, Mason runs his prosecutors for judgeships, giving him troublesome shot at power over the prosecution and then the judgment of those indicted.
Too much power equals too little real justice.
Somebody’s going to have to explain how this serious power shift makes sense before trying to sell reform.
The Pee Dee, Mason and some Republicans are trying to jam through a change without real public input or understanding.
What the Pee Dee, Mason and the Republicans are hoping for is that Cuyahoga County voters are so fed up with corruption of some public officials that they will vote for anything that smells like reform.
But this reform is not so sweet smelling, no matter how much the Pee Dee editorializes in its news and editorial columns.
Let’s not get stampeded into a reform that makes us unhappy and less safe from powerful forces and politicians.
Links:
[1] http://realneo.us/content/heres-100000-its-not-approval-huh
[2] http://realneo.us/content/roldo-bartimole-0
[3] http://realneo.us/content/how-cheap-can-you-get-pretty-damn-cheap