Farm Bureau Opposes Legislature Downsizing

Representative Joshua D. Shapiro, Chairman
Speaker's Commission on Legislative Reform
27B East Wing
Harrisburg, PA 17120-2153

RE: Comments relative to legislative reforms being considered by the Commission including size of the legislature, open records and term limits

Dear Representative Shapiro,

Pennsylvania Farm Bureau appreciates the opportunity to provide comment to the Commission on several issues of importance to our over 40,000 rural and farm family members in the state related to legislative reforms being considered. 

Farm Bureau Opposes Legislature Downsizing

Pennsylvania Farm Bureau members have adopted clear policy direction opposing any reduction in the size of the legislature from its current 253 seats.  Any reduction of size to the legislature will only result in less representation of the more rural and agricultural areas of the state.  Most people do not think of farmers when they think of minority groups.  But the population numbers clearly show that farmers make up a small minority of Pennsylvania’s population.  The 2002 Agricultural Census estimates that 85,000 farmers are operating 58,000 farms in Pennsylvania.  Pennsylvania’s farm population is only 0.7 percent of Pennsylvania’s total population 12.2 million estimated for 2000 under the U.S. Census.

According to population estimates reported in the Pennsylvania Abstract, between 1990 and 2000, Pennsylvania’s rural population declined by nearly 875 thousand, while Pennsylvania’s urban population increased by more than 1.25 million.  During this time, the relative percentage of Pennsylvania’s population living in rural areas declined from 31 percent to 23 percent.  This is a significant decline, and has already affected the demographic make-up of many legislative districts in the Commonwealth.

Farm and rural areas have distinct needs – needs that may differ significantly from those of more urban areas and populations.  Shifts have already occurred in make-up of legislative districts to more urban areas as a result of recent changes in Pennsylvania population demographics.  Further efforts by the legislature to reduce the number of legislative districts will reduce even further the level of representation provided in the legislature to rural areas, and may further erode the desire of our legislature to seriously consider the needs of Pennsylvania’s rural population in future legislative action.

The forefathers of the United States Constitution recognized that representation based solely on population would not fully serve the needs of all the people, or the needs of the various classes that may exist among our nation’s citizens.  The design in our Constitution to establish a bicameral legislature, with one chamber based on population and the other providing a more equal geographic representation, helps to preserve the nation’s consideration of the needs and interests of those citizens living in less populated regions.

While individual states and their legislatures may not have the legal ability to structure legislative representation exclusively on geography, the bicameral system with more numerous districts representing smaller numbers of people, better ensures that the interests of less densely populated areas do not get left behind in exercise of democracy, and that legislative action does not merely become a tyranny of the majority.

Whether individual citizens live as part a majority or as part of a minority, all citizens want their government to be theirs, and their government to legitimately consider their individual needs.  We strongly believe that the underlying reason behind the call for “reform” of the General Assembly is the pervading attitude among Pennsylvanians that the legislature is no longer their legislature.  Reducing the size of the General Assembly will not address, and in rural areas may aggravate this attitude.  Larger legislative districts will only bring a reduction in representation and services for individual needs.

Some may attempt to justify the need to reduce the size of the legislature by trying to compare Pennsylvania’s total number of legislators with those of other states.  However a truer and more valid comparison is the number of citizens represented in Pennsylvania’s legislative districts versus the number of citizens represented in legislative districts of other states.

It is our understanding that among states in our nation, the average number of citizens represented by individual state representative is 56,864 and the average number of citizens represented by an individual state senator is 148,733.  In Pennsylvania, each House member represents 61,283 citizens and each Senator represents 248,812 citizens.  Thirty-six states have House members representing fewer people than Pennsylvania, and forty-two other states have fewer people being represented by Senate members. 

Simply stated, the number of citizens being represented by a single legislator exceeds for the most part the number of citizens being represented by a single legislator in other states.  Or to put it another way, an individual Pennsylvanian is already afforded less representation per legislative district than an individual citizen of other states.
When Pennsylvania is compared with other states in terms of strength of citizen representation within legislative districts, Pennsylvania’s number of House and Senate members in the General Assembly is clearly shown not to be excessive, and reduction in the current size of the General Assembly is not justified.

Any effort to downsize the legislature would seriously hurt the opportunity for those in rural areas to have a meaningful voice in our Commonwealth’s business and will even further disenfranchise rural residents from state government.

Farm Bureau Opposes Further Providing For Open Records

Our farmers continually face increasing amounts of regulation at the state level that require them to report to government agencies information that historically has been considered confidential to them.  While this information may be needed for regulating agencies to protect public health and safety and ensure environmental quality and food safety, legislation that would provide to anyone unfettered access to any information received by government officials and that fails to adequately protect sensitive material from “open records” access could jeopardize the safety and security of farmers’ operations as well as other sites and operations in which harm to the public could be seriously inflicted through misuse.

Without adequate safeguards and protections from public access, an extremely liberal expansion of open records laws could provide members of the public the opportunity to use the information they received through “right to know” to inflict serious harm upon the public and upon public and private establishments.  Further legislative efforts to extremely expand the scope of public access to any information provided to regulatory agencies will only discourage farmers from providing complete and accurate information to regulatory officials.  

Farm Bureau Supports Term Limits

Pennsylvania Farm Bureau members support the imposition of term limits on state legislators.  Specifically, Farm Bureau policy supports increasing the length of terms in the House of Representatives from two to four years and then limit years served to eight.  Policy regarding Senate terms supports two six-year term limitations.  Our members view the public trust being best served by individuals who are elected to serve for limited time frames rather than career politicians who must constantly be seeking re-election.  Lengthening terms between elections and limiting terms served would also greatly reduce the number of political campaigns that would need to be financed, and the strain in personal and financial resources that current election terms place on candidates for the legislature.

Thank you for your consideration of our positions on these issues, as the Commission considers proposed legislative reforms.

                                                          Sincerely,

                                                          Joel Rotz, Director
                                                          State Governmental Relations 

cc:    Commission Members