COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Ohio Farmers Union, with 4,000 family farmer and consumer members statewide, is calling on rural Ohioans to support State Issue 1.

“For decades Ohio has wrestled with establishing a fair way to set legislative districts every ten years,” OFU Presdident Joe Logan said.

“Politicians in both parties have failed us – Democrats in the 2000s and Republicans since then. Issue 1 takes the politicians out of the process and is the best shot we’ve had in years to get fair, compact districts that allow for real representation for all communities in Ohio.”

OFU has passed several ‘special orders of business’ at its state conventions over the past decade on gerrymandering. OFU hoped that the most recent, legislator-driven scheme would work, but, ultimately with the politicians in charge — they ignored the spirit and letter of current law and ignored Ohio Supreme Court decisions to fix partisan-drawn lines.

Last year, OFU endorsed efforts by Citizens not Politicians, led by former Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, to bring what is now Issue 1 to this November’s ballot.

“When I was Chief Justice, our Supreme Court ruled gerrymandered maps unconstitutional seven times. Politicians drew maps to benefit themselves and their party,” O’Connor said at a recent event in Cuyahoga County.

“Now politicians are lying about Issue 1,” she added.

O’Connor is referring to recent Ohio Ballot Board and Ohio Supreme Court actions that have created misleading ballot language for Issue 1.

Contrary to the ballot language, the amendment itself states in Section 6[B]) it will “ban partisan gerrymandering and prohibit the use of redistricting plans that favor one political party and disfavor others.”

“With politicians lying about the amendment and Secretary of State Frank LaRose even abusing the power of his office to rig the ballot language, our campaign volunteers are reinforcing that Yes on 1 ends gerrymandering,” O’Connor said in a statement. “After we pass Issue 1, the legally binding language of the amendment, explicitly states that partisan gerrymandering will be permanently banned in Ohio.”

Logan said rural voters in Ohio have had their communities sliced and diced in many instances and appended to metropolitan communities with entirely different issue sets than Ohio’s farmers and rural residents. He said that partisan gerrymandering has led to super majorities of the GOP controlling the Ohio State Legislature and that these legislators are more ideological, pushing social issues over solving problems in areas like education, family farming and the environment.

Issue 1 will:

• Create the 15-member Ohio Citizens Redistricting Commission composed of Republican, Democratic, and independent citizens representing the state’s diverse geography and demographics.
• Ban current or former politicians, political party officials, and lobbyists from serving on the commission.
• Require the creation of fair and impartial districts, prohibiting any drawing of voting districts that discriminate against or favor any political party or individual politician.
• Operate under an open and independent process.

— Ohio Farmers Union

Read the original piece here.