Local Politics: Columbus City Council continues to go with the flow and the city suffers for it

Columbus City Council announced last week that it is accepting applications to fill the seat left vacant as Shayla Favor resigns to become Franklin County Prosecutor on Dec. 31.

Prior to the resignation of Councilmember Elizabeth Brown in December of 2022, vacant council seats were filled by a process that included application by interested people, nomination by councilmembers, and a vote by council. Those appointed councilmembers then ran for their seat again in the next election. This process essentially allowed the council to pick its own members and afforded a huge advantage to the appointed members, who could run as incumbents against any challengers. After much criticism, council modified the process to ask that applicants for vacant seats plan to not run for election to the seat. How they would enforce that is unclear, but given that the Franklin County Democratic Party would likely not endorse the person, they would face a steep uphill battle in an election.

In the time since Brown vacated her seat, Columbus Council has been modified to a “ward” system, in which each councilmember must live in a certain area. This means that applicants for Favor’s seat must have lived within District 7 for at least the past 12 months. District 7 covers a large swath of Columbus, including downtown, Franklinton, the University District, Italian Village, Olde Towne East, and Fifth by Northwest. 

There should be no issue finding a number of people interested in applying for the seat, which is surprising when you think about it. Not many people would normally jump at the chance to apply for a temporary job, particularly when they are the kind of accomplished and successful people that we would hope to see as city leaders. This is probably why our current leaders are encouraging people to apply for the seat even when they are not one of the pre-selected frontrunners. It is seen as a type of quid pro quo: a person uses their time applying for a seat that they have no chance of obtaining, and the city movers and shakers take notice of them and perhaps throw them a bone somewhere down the road. I feel sorry for the applicants who do not know in advance that they have no chance of being chosen.

Given the change to a ward-based system, it seems like the residents of District 7 should be mad that the council is encouraging people who don’t want to run for reelection to apply for the seat. Shouldn’t those residents get the benefit of a representative who is invested and hoping to win the approval of voters through their actions on council?

Unfortunately, it makes little difference in Columbus. A person appointed to serve only the remainder of Favor’s term is not going to act very differently from one looking to run for the seat again. Beyond a few pet projects, most of our councilmembers are moving through the job as they are told. They don’t make waves. When obviously bad legislation is proposed, they may complain in private, but they vote yes anyway.

In 2021, Forbes took a critical look at how local governments dangle hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks to sell companies such as Google and Microsoft to build server farms in their communities. Included in the report is an email from former Columbus Councilmember Brown, who expressed her disbelief at the size of a tax break being offered to Magellan, a subsidiary of Google, in relation to the small number of jobs promised. “20 jobs for a $54 million (!!!!!!) tax benefit,” she wrote in an email on March 10, 2021. “I don’t understand.” She later voted in favor of the tax breaks.

The contrast between Brown’s email and her yes vote reveal more to me about Columbus City Council than anything else I’ve ever read. I would really like to be wrong, and would love to see councilmembers take up an adverse stance on occasion. But even in the midst of masses of residents turning up to each council meeting to demand a ceasefire resolution for Gaza, and with some councilmembers sharing that they personally support a resolution, one was not brought forward for months. During that time, the council also may have violated open meetings laws, prompting state Auditor Keith Faber to send them a warning letter. 

When a resolution was finally approved, it included watered-down language that attempted to placate everyone, which of course satisfied no one. Even in the face of genocide, our individual councilmembers could not put forward a statement that hadn’t been pre-cleared and sterilized.

Given the evidence, it is safe to say that whoever is chosen to replace Favor can be counted on to go with the established flow. It is unfortunate for our residents. We deserve councilmembers who are deeply invested in their neighborhoods, who are motivated to make big moves to improve our city, who will burn political capital if needed, and who will disagree with their colleagues and fight for better legislation. I believe that a big reason that Columbus lags so far behind other big cities is our local government structure, which disincentivizes bold ideas and strategies.

The problems could be solved with a true ward-based system of council representation, meaningful campaign finance limits, and a county Democratic Party that acted on democratic principles. Absent these things, we will continue to be represented by interchangeable placeholders, and we will continue to be governed by the ideas of the past.