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ROKITA: Rebutting the redistricting naysayers
As I travel the state of Indiana and talk about rethinking redistricting, I’ve noticed that once Hoosiers are made aware of our “wild west” type of redistricting process, they tend to agree it needs to be reformed.
A productive discussion is under way, and the campaign is being adopted by others.
I expect that as we continue this discussion over the next year, the initial interest will build into strong demand for the General Assembly to use specific criteria in the redistricting process — like keeping communities of interest together, utilizing compactness in their design and eliminating the use of political data to draw partisan districts. Already Gov. Mitch Daniels has made the discussion all the more real by stating he looks forward to signing a bill based on these principles.
The Web site, rethinkingredistricting.com, shows what could have been done at the beginning of the decade and what could be done in the future if the General Assembly follows an agreed-upon — preferably statutorily prescribed — set of criteria that puts people and communities before politics. This is a simple exercise that would dramatically increase competition in our elections, and competition is healthy and absolutely necessary if our republic is to be maintained.
Like we have done in other areas of the election process, as well as with broader issues in our state, this reform would move us directly to the front of the pack. But it will take leadership.
Having said all that, a few misconceptions have emerged. Some glum-like characters found around the Statehouse and quoted in newspapers have concluded that redistricting reform is “doomed” and “will never work.” For the purpose of furthering the discussion, allow me to offer some counterpoints to some issues that have been raised.
Misconception: That “rethinking redistricting” calls for an independent commission or otherwise takes the job of redistricting away from the General Assembly.
Our proposal, in fact, recognizes the constitutional duty of the legislators to do their job, so long as they put the people before themselves. If they can’t or won’t do this, an independent commission would be needed. Even with a commission, the criteria I’m proposing should still be used by commission members. It is, however, too late to change the Indiana constitution as would be required to have an independent commission in place for this upcoming round of redistricting.
Misconception: Simply requiring districts to follow county and township lines is no solution.
If you go to rethinkingredistricting.com, you’ll see that the proposal has quite a bit more to it than simply following existing community boundaries like county and township lines. But this is a very important part of the process. In addition, we should “nest” two house districts into every senate district, and prohibit the use of political data for partisan gain. When combined, these suggested criteria would drastically improve Indiana’s voting process and lessen voter confusion.
Misconception: You must use vote history data to draw maps so that they comply with federal law.
It’s true that some demographic data, not necessarily vote history, could at some point be needed to review the maps to ensure their constitutionality and compliance with certain federal laws, but political data used for partisan purposes can and should be kept completely out of the process. The Indiana Supreme Court specifically did not use vote history when drawing the current Marion County City-County Council lines in 2003.
Misconception: It doesn’t matter to voters.
So far, the data shows tremendous interest. More than 3,500 people have come to rethinkingredistricting.com and more than 500 letters have been sent to legislators to let them know Hoosiers don’t want politically driven redistricting in 2011. This is a threshold issue that impacts all other issues, from roads to health care to taxes. If you agree, please lend your voice and go to www.rethinkingredistricting.com to contact your legislators now.
— Todd Rokita is Indiana’s secretary of state
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BAYLOR: Dear Pat
“I can’t help but wonder if we’ve made a mistake in settling down in New Albany. This place is nuts.”
The words quoted above are real. I didn’t make them up. They were spoken to me by a friend who wasn’t raised here, like you and I were, you in the city, and me in the county.
Perhaps neither of us is able to see the counter-productive political dysfunction holding sway hereabouts quite as clearly as someone who views our home turf with clear, unprejudiced eyes — the type of person far too many natives persist in dismissing and deriding as an “outsider.”
Pat, we don’t know each other that well, and during the time since you were elected to represent the 4th council district, we’ve had a few heated debates over politics, policy and public affairs. Let’s forget those. The reason why I’m writing you today is because of my friend, who came here from somewhere else because he and his wife believe in our city’s largely untapped potential. In spite of our differences, Pat, it’s always been my view that at some level, you genuinely “get it.”
As such, what are we to tell my friend — tell him, and her, and “them people,” as your caterwauling council colleague Dan Coffey has oft times referred to anyone who is educated, artistic, productive and capable? Are we to follow Coffey’s lead and turn away the new blood — the sort of people that any community needs to build, grow and prosper — or shall we harness, integrate and welcome them to a city that values their presence and benefits from their labors?
I know what you’re thinking, and you’re right, Pat. It isn’t about newcomers alone. It’s about those who already live here — most importantly, about their children. It’s a cliché, but children are the city’s hope and its future. In the past, our best and brightest tended to leave town, because we couldn’t offer the sort of economic, cultural and lifestyle opportunities they regarded as necessary to stay. This needs to change, and in some respects, it has.
Surely we can agree: When it comes to education and educational opportunities, that selfishness, resentment and spite have no conceivable place in the discussion.
And yet, Pat, since you’ve served on the city council, can unbiased, neutral observers reach any other conclusion than this one:
New Albany’s city council, as permitted by its members to be dominated by a regressive, anti-intellectual faction led by Dan Coffey and abetted by Steve Price, has consistently stood against education, and educational attainment, and sustainable economic development flowing as a natural consequence of education?
I’m trying earnestly not to exaggerate the Coffey-led council’s anti-educational bias, which in practice might better be referred to as an aversion to human progress in virtually any quantifiable form, except you and I both know the malignancy is there, and profoundly damaging.
My question to you, Pat: If you know better, and I think you do, then why, at this late juncture, is your name so closely linked politically with theirs?
Consider last week’s tragicomic school closings. If ever there were a time for this pointlessly fractured, hopelessly divided council (and that’s just the eight strong Democratic contingent) to come together, call a special town hall meeting, posture, grandstand, point fingers and squawk, this was it: Neighborhood schools being closed in three downtown council districts, hampering if not outright crippling revitalization prospects and economic development for decades to come.
Predictably, none of it occurred. As a body, the council was silent, and the only way to explain its timidity is outright malice on the part of its movers and shakers. City Hall came out forcefully against the school closings, and almost certainly, that’s why the Coffey-Price “let’s pretend to be Democrats and hope that we all fail” faction refrained from comment.
That they fail as individuals to see any value in progress merely seals the deal on their crass political absenteeism. Either way, it’s another black eye for a city already ill disposed toward insight.
Understood: Times are hard. The business climate is tough, and yet quite a few people, many of them from elsewhere, have invested in downtown New Albany. To cite one example, the new State Street branch of Wick’s Pizza has been its best performing store in metro Louisville. Wick’s is situated in Coffey’s council district, and yet he hasn’t missed an opportunity to speak and act against such development, to bad-mouth entrepreneurs, and to urge future investors to stay away from New Albany.
Pat, is this really leadership?
(No, Roger, it isn’t.)
I know you believe that. I know you’re better than that. I know you have what it takes to lead. But Pat, here’s what bothers me.
Why do you tolerate it, and why do you persist in voting with Coffey and Price?
Sorry, no; you can’t explain it by saying that the issues upon which you’ve been marching lockstep with the council’s ward heeling looters — sewer rate votes, audit envy, public safety and dollar-and-cents issues —are somehow different in nature from the spiteful, repugnant, self-debilitating attitude toward the city’s future displayed by these same congenital “no” voters. The non-governing principles prefacing book burning and tea parties are exactly the same.
Pat, it’s eloquently simple even though it’s excruciatingly hard.
When the time finally comes for last call — not a quick pint before the trip home from the warm pub on a cold, desperate and anonymous night just like all the rest, but the punching of the big ticket and the cosmic bow prior to that most irrevocable of all curtains falling, how will posterity judge your political legacy?
Was it progressive or regressive?
Was it Dan Coffey’s legacy … or yours? -
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