Lorain County appears poised to see a shift in its congressional representation under a Republican-backed redistricting plan set to be introduced to the Ohio House of Representatives today.
Sutton
As of Monday none of the area’s legislators — including state Rep. Matt Lundy, D-Elyria, who sits on the committee that will have to review the plan before it goes to the full House — had seen the plan.
But Lundy and others said the talk of Columbus has U.S. Rep. Betty Sutton, D-Copley Township, being pushed out of Lorain County and into a district that would pit her against U.S. Rep. Jim Renacci, R-Wadsworth, in the 2012 election.
Sutton’s current district runs from northeastern Lorain County through parts of Cuyahoga and Medina counties and into Summit County. Renacci’s District includes parts of Medina and Ashland counties and all of Stark and Wayne counties.
“While we haven’t seen a map, Betty Sutton is running because the stakes are at an all time high for the hard-working, middle-class people she has been fighting for and representing from Northeast Ohio,” Sutton’s spokesman, Anthony DeAngelo, said in a prepared statement. “She’s prepared for whatever lies ahead.”
U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Toledo, who represents the remainder of Lorain County as well as Erie, Ottawa and part of Lucas counties, would see her current district pushed farther east into regions of Cuyahoga County now represented by U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Cleveland.
“If the idea is to put as many Democrats in one district as you can, this is how you do it,” Kaptur spokesman Steve Fought said.
Population shifts noted in the 2010 U.S. Census have required Ohio to trim its current 18-member congressional delegation down to 16 members. With Republicans in control of the state Legislature and all of the state’s executive offices the GOP has had full control over the process of redrawing districts.
“It will be bipartisan in that Democrats will be there,” said state Rep. Dan Ramos, D-Lorain. “We’ll be voting, but we won’t be drawing the lines. That will be done by the Republican leadership.”
No matter whose district Lorain County falls in, Ramos said he hopes the county will have a single representative in Washington.
“I would like to see our county more unified because we’ll have a better voice,” Ramos said.
Kaptur has said previously that she too believes Lorain County should be part of a single congressional district and Fought echoed that sentiment Monday.
The problem, he said, is that Republicans are looking to create solidly Republican and Democratic districts that effectively take the question of who will win in a November election out of the hands of voters.
“That’s what gerrymandering does, it cuts the middle out and draws districts to the extremes, to the left or right,” Fought said.
The conventional wisdom in Columbus and Washington is that Ohio will end up with 12 of its 16 congressional districts being in Republican hands.
Those are numbers that don’t sit well with Ramos, who is quick to point out that Ohio has a long history of being a presidential battleground because Republicans and Democrats are roughly equal in numbers in the state.
“I don’t think that we should be 75 percent of either party,” Ramos said.
State Rep. Terry Boose, R-Norwalk, and state Sen. Gayle Manning, R-North Ridgeville, said they haven’t seen the map of what the state’s new congressional districts will look like either.
Boose said he’d like to see the plan approved by the end of the week, although Lundy said he doesn’t think that will be long enough for the public to have a say in the new districts.
The idea, Lundy said, is to create the best possible districts for voters, not political parties. More discussion, he said, could lead to a better redistricting plan.
“I just think it’s a real disservice to the voters when we don’t provide competitive district,” he said.
Contact Brad Dicken at 329-7147 or bdicken@chroniclet.com.
