Secretary Rokita calls for redistricting changes

Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita has called for state legislators to reform the process through which legislative districts are defined, saying the current maps were drawn with political interests in mind.

“That’s why there are oddly shaped districts with chunks cut out of them or that jut off in different directions,” said Jim Gavin, communications director for Rokita.

Gavin said the current districts, which were drawn in 2001, are producing undesirable results.

They are too “safe” for one political party or another, inhibiting competition in elections.
Gavin said that 40 percent of the legislative races between 2002 and 2008 went without a major party opposition.

By law, Indiana’s congressional and state legislative districts must be redrawn by the end of the 2011 session, after the federal government approves 2010 census data.

Rokita has proposed a set of reforms for the process, including keeping communities of interest together, creating districts that are geographically compact, respecting the boundaries of political subdivisions and prohibiting the use of political data in the process.

Indiana law only specifies that districts be contiguous, meaning they can jut into each other like puzzle pieces, but one district cannot include two unconnected pieces.

With only this restriction, legislators can easily use political data such as voting history and incumbent addresses to draw the districts, Gavin said.

Rep. Jerry Torr, R-Carmel, introduced a bill in 2006 that would have created a bipartisan commission charged with redrawing the maps every 10 years.

The bill passed in the House but was not granted a hearing in the Senate.

Torr’s bill would have made it a felony to use voting history data as a consideration in the redistricting process. Torr said he has been pushing this issue since 2006 because of the unfairness of the 2001 map.

“They were created to serve politicians rather than voters,” Torr said. “All you have to do is look at the maps to see what’s wrong with them.”

But not everyone is on the same page about the methods for reform.

Rep. Matt Pierce, D-Bloomington, said there is a legitimate debate to be had about how to redraw the maps, but he said the approach proposed by Secretary Rokita is “silly.”

Pierce said that, in keeping with the “one person, one vote” standard for legislative redistricting outlined by the Supreme Court, districts have to be as equal in population as possible, so each individual’s vote has roughly equal weight statewide.

Pierce said he does not believe the maps could be redrawn to follow that standard and also rigidly respect geographical boundaries.

“(Torr’s) parameters don’t make any sense,” Pierce said.

But Gavin said most of the opposition to Rokita’s ideas has been in the form of “attacking the messenger” rather than attacking the message.

“One of (Rokita’s) main goals is to make sure that elections matter to people, make sure that every election is relevant, every election has purpose and every election is a competition between the opponents so that the best candidates emerge, the best office holders emerge, and out of the process you get better representation in Congress and a better voice representing each community,” Gavin said.