Wozniak's Lucas Co. reform plan draws notice

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With the possibility of getting a Lucas County government reform question on the Nov. 2 ballot becoming unlikely, focus shifted Tuesday to Commissioner Tina Skeldon Wozniak's proposal to convene a group of business, labor, and university representatives into a charter-writing team.

Ms. Wozniak said she would contact the University of Toledo's Urban Affairs Center and a former president of the now-defunct Corporation for Effective Government to organize what she calls the third way.

"I'll make the initial calls to invite people to come together. I think the only way to get this going is if the citizenry, the business community, the university take some steps forward," Ms. Wozniak said.

Acknowledging the political sensitivity of reorganizing county government, she said, "I want to make sure it's not just the political people, it's not just me, not just Ben, not just Pete."

Ms. Wozniak wants a representative group to draft a charter to go on the November, 2011, ballot.

Both of Ms. Wozniak's colleagues, Commission President Pete Gerken and Commissioner Ben Konop, have advanced their own plans.

However, both plans depend on being able to collect large numbers of signatures in a short time frame that is running out.

Mr. Gerken's proposal is to elect a 15-member charter commission that would propose a new charter to go on the ballot in 2011. Candidates for the commission would need to collect more than 1,400 signatures to get on the ballot.

Rather than put his proposal up for a vote during yesterday's commissioner meeting, as was expected, Mr. Gerken said he would leave it on the agenda for two more weeks.

"My plan is now more hinging on the viability of the Olivia Summons business leadership. I would think that the next couple of weeks will give us the opportunity to gauge if that is a credible, viable, and reasonable way to go forward," Mr. Gerken said.

Ms. Summons is a former president of the Corporation for Effective Government, a business-based group that specialized in studying government reform issues. She and a dozen colleagues have offered to study county government reform for the commissioners.

Ms. Summons said yesterday she hasn't heard yet how or if the commissioners want to use her group.

Mr. Konop's proposal is the only one with a detailed plan so far. If voters approved, the current system of three commissioners and eight row officers would be replaced by a county executive, an 11-district county council, and prosecutor, all elected.

Mr. Konop campaigned for public support of his plan, arguing that Lucas County's economy is in dire shape because county government lacks the ability to get behind a unified economic development policy.

He said the unwillingness of the business community to support his idea, and the fact his two colleagues came out with competing plans, effectively killed his chances of gathering the 14,289 signatures required to put the question on the Nov. 2 ballot.

In addition, he was informed this week by Lucas County Elections Director Linda Howe that the deadline to submit those signatures to the commissioners is not July 25 as he said he was advised by the state attorney general, but July 15, under a change in state law that takes effect Friday.

So far, neither Ms. Wozniak nor Mr. Gerken has detailed his or her ideas for county reform. During the discussion at yesterday's commissioner meeting, Mr. Gerken and Mr. Konop sniped over their competing plans.

After Mr. Gerken declared he would delay a vote on his proposal two more weeks, Mr. Konop asked if anyone had approached him about being on the commission.

Mr. Gerken answered, "No," adding, "My petition drive's in about the same shape yours is."

To which Mr. Konop said, "I totally disagree. Your petition from the beginning was an effort to stall and foreclose change."

Mr. Konop said Mr. Gerken and Ms. Wozniak should support a petition to let voters decide whether to adopt his proposed county charter.

Contact Tom Troy at:

tomtroy@theblade.com

or 419-724-6058.