Yesterday this Indiana Law Blog entry included quotes from a story in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette on the paucity of women-appointees to high-level positions in the new Daniels' administration. Today the Journal Gazette has an editorial titled "Daniels and Diversity." Some quotes:
If initial appointments made by the governor-elect are any indication, state government in the next four years will look mostly like Mitch Daniels himself – white and male. Of 22 major appointments announced so far, only four are women, only two are black. There are no Hispanics. For a state with 6.2 million residents – 51 percent female, 9 percent black and 4 percent Hispanic – the dearth of minority and female appointments is troubling. * * *Posted by Marcia Oddi at December 31, 2004 08:01 AMThe previous administrations, to be sure, were lacking in minority representation, but there was no shortage of talented, dynamic women. In addition to Lt. Gov. Kathy Davis, women headed the state budget office, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, Department of Local Government Finance, Department of Environmental Management, Family and Social Services Administration and Department of Correction, and served as Kernan’s chief of staff.
Daniels’ appointments, by contrast, have even prompted questions about the authority of the few women named so far. Some are wondering, for example, how much of a role Fort Wayne’s Pat Miller will have as CEO of the state’s Economic Development Commission now that Indianapolis businessman Mickey Maurer has been named as its president.