While I understand and agree with the philosophical point Robert makes, I don't know if that's really true in practice. The idea of "rotten boroughs" with low voter participation and inviting corruption would require fairly small districts. (It's also not one person, one vote; but one person, three or four votes.)
With the restructuring proposal for the school board, we're talking about Minneapolis being carved into 6 districts. That's over 60,000 people per district. Compare that to the 13 city wards, 10.5 state house districts, and 6 park board districts. That's a pretty sizeable plot of land for a single interest to control due to political non-participation. While there is a disparity in voter turnout in Minneapolis (in 2004 Ward 6 had a 58% turnout (the lowest) and Ward 13 had an 81% turnout (the highest)), I don't think that's at the level that gives a citizen in one district a significant amount of more power than in another district. What districts would do is give a concerned parent or voter someone who they could contact, who is going to be much more inclined to be accountable to them. The candidates have to win that area of the city. A district-based school board official will be less inclined to ignore the concerns of schools in their district. Now, if we split up the school board districts even further (say 12 districts), I think we'd have problems. We'd have neighborhood school pitted against neighborhood school. But this middle of the road option I think would balance concerns that some areas of the city are favored and some are ignored by the board. One of the current board members responded to me that the board exists for all Minneapolis school children and therefore it is important to be elected citywide, versus a neighborhood. But I think in practice that means we elect folks to 4 year terms, and the office is far enough down-ballot, and the power of party endorsement and incumbancy is strong enough, that they are accountable to no one. If I have a Board member for my area of the city, you better bet I know what they are going to be up to and will scream and holler if I think they are going the wrong direction. It'd be easier for someone to mount a viable campaign against them too. This proposal still has 3 at-large seats, a full third of the board. I think it's a good balance, but does anyone else have a suggestion on how to better address the regional and accountability concerns with the current 7-seats-at-large board? And lastly, the entire Mpls House delegation supports this restructure. With a DFL-controlled Senate, why haven't our Mpls state senators brought this to the floor yet? Derek Burrows Reise Longfellow, Mpls >I simply don't see why this is desirable. In the current arrangement, >it's one person, one vote. In the proposed new arrangement, the votes >of citizens in parts of town where no one turns out will have a >disproportionate weight. The reason that some areas have "no voice, >no recourse, no power," is that the people in those areas don't show >up at the ballot box. You can give them a district of their own, but >if they don't bother to show up at the polls, they still won't have >any voice. All you will have done is create some "rotten boroughs," >where the few who do bother to vote will own a seat. That's a recipe >for corruption, not representation. >-- >Robert P. Goldman >ECCO >rpgoldman at real-time.com __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[email protected] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
