Local group Fair Share for Cincy submitted around 13,400 signatures to Cincinnati's auditor on Wednesday to get a charter amendment on the ballot this November. According to the group, the amendment would write a requirement for proportional representation into law and allow the city of Cincinnati to negotiate with the Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana (OKI) Regional Council of Governments to get the city more representation on the Council's board.
The OKI Board of Directors has 118 members and is comprised of elected and appointed representatives from eight area counties. Members come from local communities ranging from the area's most densely populated cities to some of its smallest communities. The board determines funding for infrastructure projects like roads and transportation, distributing billions of dollars around the region.
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Fair Share for Cincy says the board has a lot of power, but the region's largest city — Cincinnati — doesn't have as much of a voice on the board as it should.
Representatives from the city of Cincinnati make up a small number of OKI's 118 member board, despite making up a larger portion of the region's population.
Organizer Matt Butler says under OKI's current structure, suburban and lower-populated areas have a disproportionate amount of power compared to Cincinnati.
"Cincinnati is way underrepresented. It's only 0.65 votes per 100,000 residents, where some of the suburban interests have many, many times that," Butler told WVXU.
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If passed, the amendment would allow Cincinnati to maintain its membership in OKI only if its voting power is proportionately based on its population and members of local governments have at least 90% of the total votes of the governing board. The amendment language stipulates agencies like the Ohio Department of Transportation, the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, Indiana Department of Transportation, and the Southwest Ohio Regional Transit Authority cannot have a combined total of more than 10% of the voting power. If these changes aren't made 60 days after the amendment's adoption, Cincinnati will withdraw its membership, though the city would still be eligible to receive its share of funding.
OKI's response
OKI CEO and Secretary of the Board Mark Policinski says the proposed amendment is a city of Cincinnati issue that wouldn't require the Board of Directors to change. Policinski claims he hasn't heard any members from Cincinnati complain about the city's representation, and the consensus among the board is that its current structure gives the entire region an equal voice.
"You can't have a regional organization if there's dominance by any one particular group," Policinski told WVXU.
OKI states nearly 100% of board votes have been unanimous for the past 20 years. Between 2010 and 2028, Cincinnati received 31% of Ohio's funding from OKI, which Policinski says is fair. He says changing the voting structure wouldn't bring more money or infrastructure to the city.
"[Fair Share for Cincy] started out by saying that OKI's voting structure prevented the City of Cincinnati from getting its fair share of dollars from OKI and that if there were representational voting by population they would get more. That is factually not true," Policinski said. "We are giving Cincinnati what they've requested from us."
Fair Share for Cincy says it has collected enough signatures in the past few months to make the November ballot. Those signatures will need to be verified before the amendment moves forward, however. The group plans to collect more signatures in the coming weeks to ensure the issue gets in front of voters in the fall.
