Single-member districts for county commission?
Lee County voters will get an opportunity in 2026 to decide whether to make a substantive change in how Lee County commissioners are elected.
Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday signed HB 4001: Lee County, which will bring to referendum a proposal to elect our county commissioners by district instead of “at-large.”
Elections by district are decided by voters who live in a geographic district, meaning Lee County voters will cast one ballot for “their” county commissioner.
The current process, at-large voting, means Lee County voters have five votes, one for each of the five commissioners who now represent each of us.
The legislation was sponsored by State Rep. Mike Giallombardo, R-Cape Coral. The referendum to let voters decide will be held in 2026 with the conversion to single-member voting to begin in 2028 if voters approve.
We don’t think much of the idea and we didn’t either when a similar proposal for Lee County School Board elections came before the voters in 2014.
Despite voter approval of that legislation — which also took the number of the school board seats from five to seven to retain two at-large seats — we still can’t make the math make sense.
Why would we trade five votes for one, trade accountability to each registered voter to just the 20% or so in any particular district?
We expect the same arguments — and big money — to work to sell this one: Proponents say it will be easier, and cost less, to run for office within a particular district instead of countywide. They also will say these “single-member” districts will provide for better representation within each district.
To these arguments, we again say pshaw: “Easier” and “cheaper” for politicians does not equate to “better” for taxpayers. Especially when those taxpayers will be stripped of the ability to elect a board they believe to be best able to represent the county as a whole.
More importantly, the change more than a decade ago didn’t get us better schools nor did it foster more diverse representation.
We’re going to be a hard sell on the benefits of this one.
— Breeze editorial