Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 29, 1993 TAG: 9309070179
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Unlike Farris' assertion of a link between abortion and breast cancer, Allen's comments about the state's local-government system actually had some substantive relevance to the campaign.
What's more, Allen's remarks reflected more thinking about, or at least attention to, the subject of Virginia's system of local government than his Democratic opponent, Mary Sue Terry, has so far displayed.
In interviews with two Southside newspapers, Farris managed to merge a couple of hot-button topics - abortion and cancer - into a single if factually dubious point. Citing a 1989 study in New York, he said women who have had abortions are significantly more susceptible to breast cancer than women who haven't.
Farris, a lawyer and would-be medical expert, seems to have fallen willing victim to the trap of assuming that a single scientific study or experiment, without consistent replication, is conclusive.
The New York study, it turns out, is but one of several on the subject. Results of the various studies are in conflict. Evidence of any abortion-cancer link (including the alternative possibility that abortion may f+ilesseno the risk of breast cancer) is at the moment too inconclusive to play a useful role in public-policy formation. In any case, it seems safe to suggest that the health risk to women is not the reason Farris opposes abortion.
In a way, it is the irrelevance of Farris' comments that provide their chief relevance to the campaign. They reinforce questions about his understanding of the office he seeks, and about his purposes in running.
By contrast, the issue of restructuring what Allen termed Virginia's ``fairly anachronistic'' system of local government is a subject highly relevant to a campaign for state office. It would be so in any event, but is made even more so by the fact that a series of studies in recent decades have agreed in their general conclusion: Virginia's system is broke and needs fixing.
Even if some individual localities benefit (or believe they benefit), the studies have concluded, the overall result of the current system is inefficiency, waste, and roadblocks to the regional provision of services - including planning and economic development - that are of an obviously regional character.
Lately, the ``even if'' part has also come under challenge, which may help explain why Allen has chosen to be more responsive than Terry on the potentially volatile topic. Interest in this issue may seem odd for a Republican, whose primary political base is the suburbs. But the state's business community, a constituency with which Republicans must ordinarily do well to carry Virginia, is said to be worried that the continued isolation of bigger cities like Richmond and Roanoke from their suburban counties is hurting the counties as well as the cities.
It also should be noted, however, that the question of local-government restructuring is not limited to cities and suburbs in metro areas. Efforts to streamline local government also have failed in places like the Alleghany Highlands and the Staunton-Augusta area. One of the most fiercely contested recommendations of the most recent General Assembly local-government study commission was its proposal to encourage small cities like Bedford and Radford to give up their independence.
Allen's interest in local-government restructuring is tentative to a fault. His only specific remedy is the old standby, create a study committee. He wouldn't put the issue among his top priorities. He wouldn't favor any change that the people of any affected locality might oppose.
That said, Allen's interest is nevertheless welcome. It is welcome on its own account - and just maybe as a sign that he, if not his running mate, wants the Virginia Republican Party to be associated less with social-issue marginalia than with its more traditional espousal of effective, efficient government.
Keywords:
POLITICS
by CNB