Want to improve state government? Try this

Maybe, now and then, the Ohio General Assembly has new ideas. But Ohio’s House and Senate tend to react to ideas rather than initiate them.

Good example: The revelation that House and Senate leaders of both parties are reportedly discussing with each other how Ohio draws congressional districts. (Here’s a clue: Badly.)

Surely, it’s a complete coincidence the nonpartisan and broad-based Fair Districts = Fair Elections Coalition is said to be making good progress in gathering signatures for a proposed statewide ballot issue that would change (for the better) how Ohio draws congressional districts. Backers must obtain the valid signatures of at least 305,591 voters to place the Fair Districts plan on the ballot.

The Fair Districts ballot issue would take away from the General Assembly its power to draw congressional districts — and give it to the bipartisan Ohio Redistricting Commission. Voters created the commission in 2015 to draw General Assembly districts.

The legislature’s sudden attack of bipartisanship is actually an attack of political self-interest: Now, the General Assembly draws congressional districts to favor the political party that controls the General Assembly. Republicans do now. So, of Ohio’s 16 districts, 12 are held by Republicans.

The legislature’s Republicans drew those districts with help from thenU.S. House Speaker John Boehner, a Butler County Republican, who called Columbus and ordered districts like “have-ityour-way” takeout. The legislature’s Republicans delivered faster than carhops on roller skates.

Yes, General Assembly Democrats, when they could, drew Democrat-friendly districts during redistricting, which occurs every 10 years, after each Census. But in Ohio’s modern redistricting era, starting in the 1960s, the legislature was split between Democrats and Republicans only in sessions that immediately followed the 1980 and 1990 Censuses; the legislature was Republican-run in sessions that immediately followed the 1970, 2000 and 2010 Censuses.

True, bipartisan factors may figure in the General Assembly’s road-to-Damascus conversion to good government. First, there isn’t a General Assembly member alive who doesn’t daydream that she or he could move up to Congress. What better way than to draw your own district?

Second, if you’re a state legislator who wants to take a lordly member of Congress down a peg, having say-so over the boundaries of his or her district can do it. You want someone in Congress to kiss your ring? If you’re a General Assembly member, stroll around the U.S. Capitol with a map of Ohio and a Magic Marker. That’ll do it.

If General Assembly leaders of both parties really do thirst for genuine Statehouse reform, there’s plenty on the to-do list, such as:

■ Asking voters to convert Ohio’s two-chamber General Assembly into a one-chamber (unicameral) legislature, such as Nebraska’s. Making the General Assembly unicameral was discussed in the 1930s — and should be again. At a minimum, it would make it harder to hide who does what to kill, delay or block good legislation. Today’s two-chamber falderal helps hide that.

■ Demonstrating bravery by asking voters to repeal legislative term limits, which have made the executive branch more powerful than the legislative branch, and lobbyists more powerful than either. Repealing term limits would be a tough sell. But repeal could pass, perhaps by a show of sacrifice by incumbents — requiring, say, that if term limits were repealed, they’d still apply to legislators already in office at that time.

■ Letting voters elect the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. Maybe, as critics argue, elected utility commissions are no more responsive to consumers. But PUCO campaigns would at least decode, from today’s rate-case gobbledygook, what’s really at stake at the Statehouse for Ohio utility consumers. Answer: A lot.