Now that legal challenges to Pennsylvania’s new court-drawn congressional map have been rejected, state lawmakers have turned their attention to the typical process by which the state reapportions congressional districts every decade. But some stakeholders are skeptical about whether any current proposals will ever make it to a vote. There are four bills circulating in the Statehouse right now. All call for an independent redistricting commission, but differ on details such as the role the legislature would play in the process, the number of commissioners, their qualifications, how they’d be selected and how to gauge potential partisan influences.
Senator Lisa Boscola, a Democrat representing Lehigh and Northampton counties, has sponsored related measures since 2003, according to a Keystone Crossroads analysis of Temple University’s Pennsylvania Policy Database.
Boscola says she’s flexible on some details – as long as they support the main goal of her bill and the others in play.
“I’m not married to any of this except for that I know we need an independent citizens commission of people that are not affiliated with any [elected office], they’re not elected to any office. They’re not a lobbyist. They haven’t served, their family member…all that has to be taken out of the process in order to work,” Boscola said during a four-hour long hearing this week on the bills.