Are local elections important?

Thank you so much for sharing.

My next question is for Mr. Tom.

What did you learn from your time in office about how local and state government affect each other?

Well, how they're supposed to work together, and that's the scary part today.

As Christine pointed out, we have three branches of government, and the founding fathers established that so there was what they called the balance of power.

And when all three groups do their job, we do have that balance of power.

But it seems to me, and the other thing adding to that is this whole thing of gerrymandering.

What's adding to that today is that two branches of government have abdicated in the federal level to the one, which is creating a bigger problem.

So for me, I was blessed to be in the General Assembly when there was a balance of power.

when individuals, the Supreme Court, the legislative and executive, each have their role, but there was the check and balance, which I found very concerning, doesn't exist much today.

So for me, I learned the balance of power, the importance of it, And how we need to be working together.

You know, I make policy as a legislator that impacts the other two branches.

But the other branch, the judicial, can also say to me, well, the candidate that you're looking forward to appointing to this board of this commission, we have the override.

We can say whether they can do it or not.

So when they're working together, it's powerful.

When they abdicate their authority, we have what we have today.

in the state of Ohio and in the US government.

And if I could tack on to that, too, I think that in addition to that is a lack of civility now and the lack of ability to just talk with one another and to come to compromise.

And we have a lot of conversations about that with the League of Women Voters.

And that's one of the reasons that we do forums is because we want to make sure that the ideas get across, not.

not the arguments that sometimes happen now.

And I think that's really lacking in our government right now is the ability to sit down and have a conversation with somebody in a civil manner.

And I've had conversations with, you know, other former legislators in the past.

And that's one of the things that they mentioned as well, is that back in the day, you would form relationships with the other folks on either side of the aisle.

You were actually friendly.