The House Redistricting Committee is moving closer to choosing new congressional and state house maps. James Call reports Friday, lawmakers held a three hour workshop on proposals and the committee chairman says he intends to bring a plan to the full House in two weeks.
The Senate has already passed maps for its 40 districts and 27 congressional seats. The House is digging deeper into the once-in-a-decade task of redrawing Florida’s political map. Friday Redistricting Committee members selected proposed maps to work on at their next meeting. Here Davie Representative Marty Kiar wondered about the shape of a south Florida Senate seat.
“I have a question, I’ve been wondering about District 39. District 39 currently stretches from the Keys to Hendry and Palm Beach counties. A proposal would give it a couple slivers extending from its current configuration. You see how it is a big district? Then all of a sudden there’s a little line that shoots all the way to but up against the other minority majority district. And I’m just wondering that little line right there what’s the need for it? And does that make the district contiguous?”
The Florida constitution requires the districts to be contiguous and compact. Dividing Florida’s 19 million residents into equal political districts is a complex job. Lawmakers are required to balance geography, demographics, so-called communities of interests and protect minority rights to representation. Hillsborough Representative Will Weatherford is leading the House’s redistricting efforts.
“Florida is a diverse state. I mean when you look at the diversity we have with African-Americans and Hispanics. We certainly have a lot of diversity and our maps should reflect that diversity. We think our maps this year absolutely do that.”
The desire to have the state’s political maps reflect Florida’s diversity was one of the motivations behind anti-gerrymandering provisions Florida voters approved last November. Critics say Florida’s elected leaders do not reflect voter registration numbers. Democrats have the edge in registration. Republicans have supermajorities at the statehouse and in the congressional delegation. Critics suggested this is because of the way the districts are drawn; clumping voters in groups so that one party has an advantage, this is known as gerrymandering. The Fair Districts Amendments 5 and 6 outlawed the practice.
Although leaders in the House and Senate have agreed to accept the map the other has drawn for itself House Democrats indicate they will attempt to make changes. West Palm Beach Representative Mack Bernard is digging deeper into the numbers to see if the proposals comply with the Fair Districts amendments. Bernard has an idea to redraw three south Florida senate seats that he says would protect minority voting rights without having a preponderance of minorities in just one district.
“The proposal I made in regards to District 29 changes it to be more compact so it doesn’t go into palm beach county and I believe that is a better explanation of Amendment 5 by it not coming into Palm Beach County and stays as a minority majority seat and it is compact and it changes District 33 in Miami-Dade County where now it will be compact but there will be less minorities also and then District 31 will be a coalition district where they can elect a representative of their choice.”
Representative Will Weatherford:
What’s he’s talking about is hard to see it is hard to visualize. Because again when you explain what you want a map to look like versus actually what a map looks like are two different things. We will definitely take a look at what he is suggesting in both the House, uh the Congressional map and the Senate map. I suggested from the very beginning that we want a good dialogue and we want everyone’s ideas at the table. So, I’ve encouraged Representative Bernard to bring forth an actual amendment that we can look at and tangibly see and then we will make a determination if it increases the legal compliance.”
Weatherford advised the committee to take a week to study the proposed maps. His plan is to have the committee vote on maps for the statehouse and congressional seats next Friday and for the proposals to go before the full House two weeks later.