Beware of County "Reform"

By Dusty Rhodes

County government is a limited form of government. It was never intended to be a second-tier, super government rivaling cities, villages and townships to provide local services.

County functions were established and have been improved by the state legislature for nearly a century and a half. The legislature has progressively changed the law relating to counties as circumstances have warranted. County government benefits from the checks and balances of independent, elected officials who are directly responsible to the voters.

The contrast with other forms of government is compelling. An independent Auditor or Prosecutor does not have to appease or cater to the politicians who might appoint those offices under a county charter.

It is convincing to note that 86 out of Ohio's 88 counties have not yet discovered the supposed benefits of a county-charter. Cuyahoga County's recent decision was the direct result of corruption allegations which voters there apparently were unable to correct by voting out the offending officials.

Before assuming that a county charter is desirable it would be well to wait, watch and observe the experience of Cuyahoga. So far it has not been orderly or inexpensive. A plethora of candidates for the new expanded County Commission has emerged including even a convicted murderer.

Calls for a bigger, more powerful county organization are based on a fundamental misdiagnosis. County government is a limited form of government. It was never intended to be a second-tier, super government rivaling cities, villages and townships to provide local services.

Imagine for a moment whether you, as a citizen, would hear back sooner from your village councilman, small-town mayor, township trustee or from a Hamilton County Commissioner. Size of constituency alone dictates the answer.

Besides replacing independent, elected officials with high-salaried appointed bureaucrats, the "reformer's" idea of a county commission would either be larger (like a super city council, if that appeals to you) or elected by a voting method that would be so cumbersome that neither frugality nor public understanding would accompany it.

The inevitable result of a county home-rule charter would be a new layer of more expensive government added to the current burden of taxpayers. An ordinance passing, regulation-creating county council would hurt business as well as compete unnecessarily with the local governments that know the value of real accountability.

The American experiment, which predates the reformer-ridiculed county government founding date of the 1850's, also intentionally has a separation of powers and institutional checks and balances. Like county government, it is not perfect. No human institution is, but real democracy is better than anything else.

In truth the county-charter advocates are now trying to play with the county structure to the detriment of the taxpayers and to the advantage of a few County Commissioners and professional bureaucrats who have decided that their personal accumulation of power is good for the rest of us.

Dusty Rhodes is the Hamilton County Auditor, and Chairman of the County Auditor's Association of Ohio (CAAO) Committee to Preserve and Protect Limited County Government

August, 2010