Florida: Anti-Gerrymandering Measures Didn’t Work. Here’s How Both Parties Hope to Change Them. | National Journal

Flor­ida is the only state to out­law par­tis­an ger­ry­man­der­ing while leav­ing the re­dis­trict­ing pro­cess in the hands of par­tis­an le­gis­lat­ors rather than cre­at­ing an in­de­pend­ent com­mis­sion. And after three years of lit­ig­a­tion and four months of at­tempts to draw new le­gis­lat­ive and con­gres­sion­al maps, loc­al Re­pub­lic­ans and Demo­crats have reached the con­clu­sion that the state’s unique sys­tem of re­dis­trict­ing can­not go on. Demo­crat­ic le­gis­lat­ors, in­spired by a June U.S. Su­preme Court rul­ing re­af­firm­ing the leg­al­ity of in­de­pend­ent re­dis­trict­ing com­mis­sions, hope to win Re­pub­lic­an sup­port for an in­de­pend­ent com­mis­sion to re­draw dis­trict bound­ar­ies in Flor­ida. And after months of re­dis­trict­ing chaos, some Re­pub­lic­ans have hin­ted that they could get on board.

Re­pub­lic­ans could also pre­pare for an ef­fort in 2017 to change or undo an amend­ment to the state con­sti­tu­tion, ad­ded in 2010, out­law­ing par­tis­an ger­ry­man­der­ing. Every 20 years, Flor­ida al­lows for a Con­sti­tu­tion­al Re­vi­sion Com­mis­sion, which can choose to put its own con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ments on the next statewide bal­lot. The com­mis­sion’s next ses­sion is in 2017, and most of its mem­bers are se­lec­ted by the gov­ernor or le­gis­lat­ors. A Re­pub­lic­an-stacked Con­sti­tu­tion­al Re­vi­sion Com­mis­sion could put the ger­ry­man­der­ing ban back on the 2018 bal­lot to see if voters will strike it down.

Ef­forts to pro­mote either path are in their early stages, but both sides are mo­tiv­ated to change the status quo. The ex­ten­ded re­dis­trict­ing battle has cost tax­pay­ers $11 mil­lion, ac­cord­ing to the Miami Her­ald.

“How many spe­cial ses­sions have we had? This is pre­pos­ter­ous, in that this is just a mat­ter of style, not sub­stance,” said Demo­crat­ic state Rep. Dwight Dud­ley, in an in­ter­view with Na­tion­al Journ­al. (The an­swer to his rhet­or­ic­al ques­tion: four spe­cial ses­sions, as of Oc­to­ber.)

Full Article: Florida’s Anti-Gerrymandering Measures Didn’t Work. Here’s How Both Parties Hope to Change Them..