The question gets asked at every mayoral forum from Madisonville to Westwood, from 16-year-old high school students to septuagenarian retirees in Westwood.

Their answers implicitly acknowledge a fundamental political problem. Mark Mallory calls it "the chaos of City Hall." David Pepper calls it "the bickering at City Council."

Whatever it's called, it's become a core issue of the campaign for Cincinnati mayor. As much as crime, economic development, education and race relations, the very atmosphere at City Hall has become a pervasive political issue for any voter who's ever gone to City Hall, listened to talk radio or watched council meetings on public access cable.

Council members publicly berate the city manager and accuse department heads of insubordination on the council floor. Boycott groups spew anti-Semitic rants from a lectern before council meetings. Council members ambush their colleagues, introducing an ordinance in one breath and calling for an immediate vote in the next. Even the timing of the city manager's press releases has been micromanaged.

As the outsider, Mallory has been vocal in his criticism of how City Council does business. He's touted his experience as a consensus-builder in 10 years as a state lawmaker.

Since 1999, the mayor has appointed the vice mayor and has had the power of veto, though Mayor Charlie Luken has used it only four times - most notably on a plan to install red-light cameras. The mayor also assigns legislation to committees and appoints committee chairmen.

Luken presided over meetings but never seemed too interested in what happened in committee. "I don't sit around thinking about which legislation goes to which committee," he once said.

Luken tried to include Republicans in his council coalition, but removed Councilman Pat DeWine as chairman of the Law and Public Safety Committee in 2003, after DeWine angered the police union by voting against a police contract.

Both mayoral candidates suggest they would eject committee chairmen who buck them. Mallory speaks of what former Ohio Speaker Verne Riffe called the "ex-chairman's club" - those who didn't go along with the program.

Pepper says he'll allow his vice mayor to run many of the meetings, and serve as his chief whip on City Council - freeing him up to set the direction for the city from the first floor.

Mallory's plan is simple - in theory. Build personal relationships and consensus ahead of time, he said, and the fractious battles that play out on the floor will be a thing of the past.

In Columbus, he's earned a reputation as the rare Democrat who can work along party lines to get bills passed - and has been rewarded as the only Democrat to chair a committee, the Correctional Institution Inspection Committee.

Pepper, typically, is more methodical and process-oriented. His first order of business as a freshman councilman was to take control of an often-overlooked committee - the Rules Committee - and reform the way City Council does business.

He organized a 2002 retreat of council members - complete with personality assessments and "visioning" exercises - that resulted in a brief honeymoon of cooperation.

Committee meetings were moved from weekly to fortnightly. "By-leaves" - end-of-meeting council speeches - were curtailed. Cameras were shut off during the public speaking portion of the meeting, screening out some attention-seekers but redoubling the resolve of a small group of boycott leaders.

Some council members, in fact, found the rules stifling. Vice Mayor Alicia Reece often complained that Pepper was trying to run City Council "like a country club."

"Chaos? It's an easy tagline. It's easy when you're on the outside. It's a disservice to council," she said. "Right now, there's a major indictment of a lot of the council members. It's an unfair characterization. We have done a whole lot of work. Maybe we were too involved in the work to do a good job of marketing what was done."

Luken would agree. He said he understands Cincinnati's desire for a more civil City Council. But he said some of the most effective councils he's ever served on - including the notorious "Gang of Five" conservative coalition of the late 1980s - were also most contentious.

"The mayoral candidates say they're going to end the bickering and chaos at City Council, and I hope they do that," Luken said. "But the first thing they need is different people. The notion that they're going to get people to behave by sheer force of will is fantasy. It's not going to happen."

Indeed, that same skeptical tone has found its way into almost every question the candidates get on the topic. And more often than not, it's directed at Pepper.

Sarah Eustis, 16, a student from Hyde Park, told Pepper at a Seven Hills School debate last month that others had "tried and failed" to unite City Council. Why did Pepper think he could succeed?

"I have to disagree with you a little bit. I don't think a lot of politicians even tried. That's been the problem," Pepper said. "I don't think the problem with City Council is that the members aren't good people. It's just that they've never been asked to be part of a team. I'm not going to call them names like others do."

"Is it my turn now? Wow," Mallory said, suggesting Pepper's answer went on too long. "Building a team and working with others is not about plunking down your plan and dictating to a group of people that they have to sign on to your plan, and building a team that way. Building a team is about building relationships."

This is cache, read story here