Advocacy

This Week in Frankfort

3 Feb 2012

FRANKFORT –If you Google ‘How often do redistricting plans end up in court?’ you get 134,000 hits in 0.37 seconds.

Somewhere in all those hits, you’ll likely now find ‘Kentucky redistricting 2012.’ A lawsuit challenging the recent state legislative reapportionment has not only been filed, but resulted in a Franklin Circuit Court judge ordering the filing deadline for this year’s House and Senate primary elections be moved back at least a week, to Feb. 7, as he reviews the facts of the case.

For the average citizen, the every-decade drama over redistricting may be slightly mystifying. It sounds like the sort of inside baseball politicians play that doesn’t really affect them.

Why should they care?

Because redistricting determines representation, which is what American democracy is based upon. The end goal is to draw cohesive and population-balanced districts so every Kentuckian has an equal voice in Frankfort and in Washington.

To ensure what the courts have called ‘one person/one vote,’ state and federal law requires legislative district lines to be redrawn every 10 years, after the U.S. Census has been taken and reported. Legal requirements are stiff.

Redistricting (not just here, but nationwide, everywhere) has historically been the most highly politicized and deeply personal work any legislative body, at any level, undertakes. Parties hang their hopes and fears for future majority or minority status on it. That’s pretty political. Individual legislators’ careers can be extended or abruptly ended by it. That’s pretty personal. For citizens, it could also mean an old, trusted voice they’ve counted on to speak for them for years is shifted away from them. That’s pretty personal too.

Communities, counties, or regions can see their influence ebb and flow with each ten years’ realignment. Ethnic or majority-minority districts can wax or wane in influence. It all depends on how populations of common interest are concentrated or dispersed when lines are drawn.

Redistricting’s central role in making representative government good government is one reason the courts have taken such a keen interest in it, and laid down so many rules for what’s permissible and what isn’t. For example, splitting counties (which obviously is sometimes necessary) is, still, almost always a bone of contention. That’s one of the central complaints in the pending court challenge, which was initially brought by House Republicans, although others have joined the lawsuit and the Senate plan is part of the case too.

But the impact of the controversy is more than just long-term and philosophical.

As a practical matter, any even-year Legislature rarely takes up divisive or difficult issues until the filing deadline passes and potential electoral opposition (or lack thereof) is known. With this year’s redistricting delay, and resultant uncertainty, that effect is multiplied.

A number of this winter’s marquee items probably won’t be addressed at least until the court speaks next week. That includes most notably the long-awaited casino-gambling bill, said to be written and ready, yet still cloaked. Its presumed sponsor in the Senate said as much Wednesday, and the governor confirmed it Thursday: Redistricting first, then we see the bill.

In fact, the General Assembly didn’t meet at all Friday, to avoid losing a precious (and constitutionally limited) legislative workday from the 60-day session, while things were largely in what one top leader called ‘limbo.’

Meanwhile, another redistricting matter clogged the pipes too this week. Lawmakers themselves voted to extend by one week this year’s campaign-filing deadline for Kentucky’s six congressional seats, as work continues to resolve a House-Senate impasse on a plan to redraw those electoral districts.

Extension of the congressional filing deadline from Jan. 31 to Feb. 7 was inserted into a stripped-down version of this session’s initial congressional redistricting bill, House Bill 2, which in its original form ran aground when the Senate substituted its own substantially different plan that the House found wanting . The bill went to conference committee where the two chambers couldn’t agree on a compromise before the filing deadline.

The version of HB 2 that emerged from the conference committee and passed now contains no actual congressional redistricting. It only affects this year’s filing deadline for those federal races. 

To begin moving the hoped-for congressional plan through the legislative process again, the House placed its original blueprint in HB 302, and sent it to the Senate so negotiations could resume. Good progress has been hinted at. The House and Senate hope to reach agreement on a final bill before the extended congressional-filing deadline Tuesday afternoon.

For more information, contact scott.payton@lrc.ky.gov

EDITOR’S NOTE: The General Assembly and its administrative arm the Legislative Research Commission encourage citizen involvement in the workings of their branch of government, and maintain several means for them to do so.

The Legislature’s website -- www.lrc.ky.gov – includes comprehensive information about legislators, the legislative process, and the progress of work during the session. Contact numbers, daily meeting schedules, bill summaries and full texts, bill status information, and other information to get you involved are all posted there.

If you’d prefer phone contact, here are several toll-free numbers you might find useful:

To leave a message for any legislator: 1-800-372-718.

To check the status of a bill: 1-866-840-2835

To check meeting schedules: 1-800-633-9650

The LRC Public Information Office also sends out updates on a regular basis, and you can receive those on your home computer.

By going to PI’s eNews page at www.lrc.ky.gov/pubinfo/listserv.htm, you can subscribe to frequent e-mail updates on what’s happening at the Capitol.  In addition, the office regularly posts news briefs, Capitol Notes, at www.lrc.ky.gov/pubinfo/capitol_notes.htm that will let you to receive legislative updates at your leisure