If you enjoyed the presidential race and ensuing ballot wrangle last year, you should enjoy what’s happening with Issue 6, the campaign finance charter amendment. With 100 percent of the unofficial results counted, campaign finance reform was losing by a mere 23 votes — that’s 50.01 percent to 49.99 percent. The Hamilton County Board of Elections automatically recounts a race if the official margin of victory is less than 0.5 percent.
The cash-poor proponents of Issue 6 were full of nervous energy late Tuesday evening.
“You can say we’re waiting for the overseas ballots,” joked Bill Woods, co-chair of Citizens for Fair Elections. “It’s fairly amazing.”
Military ballots might not be a factor, but walk-in ballots might. Each election at least a couple thousand Hamilton County residents vote at wards other than where they’re registered. Sometimes that’s because they changed addresses, and sometimes it’s because they couldn’t make it to their regular wards.
These voters use a special ballot that isn’t counted with all the others on election night, according to Kathy Curran, an administrative assistant at the board of elections.
Two years ago, during the last municipal elections, almost 3,000 votes came in this way, she said.
Two weeks will likely pass before all these votes can be counted this year. If there’s still a margin of less than 0.5 percent, it’s recount time.
If Issue 6 eventually wins approval, the city will provide public financing to city council and mayoral candidates who agree to certain campaign spending and contribution limits.
Chris Finney, vice president of the tax watchdog group Coalition Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes (COAST), said the anti-reform campaign spent about $70,000 on radio and direct mail ads. Woods said Citizens for Fair Elections spent about $12,000 but its grass-roots network of volunteers probably made up the difference.
Rebuffing Keith Fangman
Issue 5, the civil service reform amendment, was almost as close, with 52 percent supporting it. But proponents were certain their 3,208-vote margin was enough to make the victory stand.
Earlier in the evening, Keith Fangman, president of the Cincinnati branch of the Fraternal Order of Police and an opponent of Issue 5, predicted a gloomy future for the police and fire divisions if the reform measure passed.
Fangman, Cincinnati Police Chief Thomas Streicher and Hamilton County Prosecutor Michael Allen all campaigned heavily against the issue, which removes civil service protection from 98 city positions, including police and fire chief.
Fangman said the police headquarters would need a revolving door because politics, not impartial civil service tests, would decide who’s hired and fired.
Betty Hull, campaign manager of the Issue 5 campaign committee, A Better Cincinnati, seemed exhilarated with the victory.
“I think the difference was that we had the facts on our side,” Hull said.
The charter amendment simply gives the city administration the power to hire the best available supervisors from around the country, including the police and fire chiefs, Hull said.
Less surprisingly, both Issue 1, the Hamilton County health and hospitalization levy, and Issue 2, the county’s children’s services levy, passed. Neither tax faced organized opposition. Issue 1 received 56 percent approval, and Issue 2 won with 65 percent of the votes. ©
This article appears in Nov 7-13, 2001.