Is the Fix Worse Than the Problem? — Dave’s Diary

The vote was 4 to 3. That’s as close as it can get. Ultimately the City council agreed to empower legal counsel to take the city redistricting plan to the judge. There was no compromise with the ACLU.

The ACLU didn’t like our plan and we didn’t like theirs -- no surprise -- so now it’s up to His Honor Judge Thomas Rice to decide what happens next to Yakima’s vote for city council process.

It’s rare when I mirror Bill Lover and Rick Ensey’s vote but they had their reasons for voting against the plan and here are some of mine.  I say “some” because there are very significant issues that can’t be discussed as long as the case is still unsettled.

1.)   Under the plan only at-large candidates could be mayor or assistant mayor. The council wouldn't have a say in who would be the most effective leader for the group -- and it is possible that an excellent council candidate wouldn’t run because they wouldn’t want the mayor’s job or have the skill set to be a good mayor.

2.)   Under the plan voters would only get one vote for two at-large seats. Clear favorites could easily split their votes and less favorable candidates would be elected by cancellation and not by choice.

3.)   The all-district system invites territorialism and opens the door for higher taxes and more spending, according to published research studies.

4.)   The National League of Cities has done a lot of work on the subject. Some of their findings, with which I agree, include:

• Council members in an at-large system can be more impartial, rise above the limited perspective of a single district and concern themselves with the problems of the whole community.
• Vote trading between council members is minimized.
• Better-qualified individuals are elected to the council because the candidate pool is larger.
• Councils elected by district elections may experience more infighting and be less likely to prioritize the good of the city over the good of their district.

In a comparative study of at-large and district cities published in Economics and Politics Vol. 9, 1997, Lawrence Southwick, Jr. determined spending debt and taxes were both significantly higher in wards than at-large districts.

http://www.yesatlarge.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/SouthwickEconomics-and-Politics.pdf

Bottom line: Read the judge’s actual decision

, re-read your constitution and then double check the demographics and see if you don’t reach the same conclusion that I did.  More to come.