11/05/2006

Op-Ed

Consultant weighs in on state proposals

By Jack Lessenberry
Columnist

Michigan voters Tuesday will face five major ballot proposals, but the vast majority of attention is directed toward just one of them: affirmative action.

Proposal 2, called "The Michigan Civil Rights Initiative," would amend the state constitution to outlaw gender or race-based affirmative action in college admissions or any kind of public hiring.

Voting yes means saying no to affirmative action. Ward Connerly, a black California businessman, and Jennifer Gratz, a 29-year-old white woman who failed to win admission to the University of Michigan, are leading the campaign to just say yes.

Opposing them is a wide coalition of civic, civil rights, chambers of commerce and labor and women's groups, which are banded together as One United Michigan.

In the final days of the campaign, One United Michigan is emphasizing the proposal's effects on women of all colors and downplaying its effects on African-Americans.

Trisha Stein, the chairman, argues that passing Proposal 2 would endanger not only minorities, but programs that include cervical cancer screenings for women.

Debbie Dingell, a General Motors executive and wife of U.S. Rep. John Dingell (D-Dearborn) is vice chair of One United Michigan. She fears Proposal 2 would endanger programs to attract women into science and math careers. That is hotly disputed by Gratz, who adds that she would ask parents "to consider if we want our daughters to receive preferential treatment while our sons are discriminated against?"

Polls show the measure a dead heat.

But Mark Grebner, one of the state's most respected political consultants, doesn't think it is close at all. He has been doing his own surveys and is convinced it will be a landslide against affirmative action.

Incidentally, Grebner, a lawyer and Ingham County commissioner, will be voting the other way. He wants to keep affirmative action.

But the sometimes cheerfully Machiavellian head of a firm he calls Practical Political Consulting Inc., says "it's just not happening. What I do differently is not ask voters an abstract question. I give them a copy of the actual ballot."

"When real white voters read the actual language and then vote secretly, about 85 percent check the yes box. Now bear in mind that this is not a scientific survey. These are mainly middle- and upper-income households. But secrecy and the ballot language is the key."

He may be on to something. The ballot language appears to tell voters that affirmative action is not needed.

"A separate provision of the state constitution already prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color or national origin," it says at the end.

"This one's over," Grebner predicted.

The only one too close to call, he said, is Proposal 5, which would mandate that school funding be slightly raised then protected from inflation and further legislative cuts, forever. This would apply both to K-12 education and state universities.

As for the other ballot propositions: Practical Political Consulting (and every other survey) says that Proposal 1, which would protect state park and conservation funding from being raided, will be approved easily.

But Proposal 3, which would allow mourning dove hunting, is going down, despite a flurry of pro-hunting ads featuring ex-Detroit Tiger slugger Kirk Gibson.

"The doves are safe," Grebner says.

Proposal 4 is also, he is convinced, headed for approval by a landslide. This would prevent government units from using their powers of eminent domain to take private property and transfer it to another private entity. Some cities have been doing this to get more tax revenue, and there has been growing resentment.

Contact Jack Lessenberry at Bucca@aol.com or write to him at 189 Manoogian Hall, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, 48202