Critics Want Redistricting Process Changed In Fla.

A controversial redistricting measure is on the ballot in Florida. The amendment would require that districts be drawn, not with regard to party politics, but with the goal of making them compact and flowing along natural geographic boundaries.

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This fall's elections count as a prelude to elections to come. Many of the winners will have a say in redistricting, which will influence who controls Congress for the next decade.

Florida voters are going to address redistricting directly, one way or another, as NPR's Greg Allen reports.

GREG ALLEN: Redistricting happens once a decade after each census. The new population information is used to redraw congressional districts and also districts for members of the state legislature.

In Florida, like many other states, that job of drawing the boundaries falls to the state legislature. But unlike most other states, the only thing Florida requires is that the districts be contiguous. That is, one connected together area. That leaves legislators lots of room for creativity.

ELLEN FREIDIN: As you can see, the district is almost shaped like a barbell.

ALLEN: Ellen Freidin has a map open on her computer screen. It's Florida State Senate District 27, which runs from the Atlantic coast, 122 miles across Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades to the Gulf Coast.

Frieden is one of the leaders of a campaign to reform Florida's redistricting process. Crossing from one end of the district to the other, she points out, would require four different forms of transportation.

FRIEDEN: They would first have to get into a car and drive to Lake Okeechobee. They would then have to get into a boat and cross parts of the lake in order to stay in the district. Then they would have to get into an airboat because they would be getting off into parts of the Everglades.

ALLEN: From there, they'd have to hike until they came to developed areas where there are roads, motor vehicles and voters. There are many other examples like this in Florida, both among legislative and also congressional districts.

It's not just that they're oddly shaped. The gerrymandering also puts, in one district, communities that are widely separated by geography, economic circumstances and local interests.

To change that, Frieden's group, Fair Districts Florida, has worked to put two amendments on the ballot in November - one for redrawing congressional, the other for redrawing legislative districts. She says, right now, districts are drawn with just one purpose in mind.

FRIEDEN: Incumbent politicians draw these districts themselves to ensure that they will be protected and that whatever is the dominant party at the time will be protected as well.

ALLEN: Republicans have held control of Florida's legislature since the mid- '90s and have used redistricting to their advantage. In earlier decades, Democrats did the exact same thing. The result, according to the National Institute on Money and State Politics, is that Florida has some of the least competitive legislative elections in the country. Incumbents retain their seats an astounding 98 percent of the time.

To make them more competitive, the fair districts amendments would require that districts become pact, equal in size, and make use of city, county and geographical boundaries. And the key provision, that districts not be drawn in a way to favor or disfavor an incumbent or political party.

Since Fair Districts Florida first began working on its ballot initiatives, the group's been opposed, mostly, by Republican leaders.

MARIO DIAZ: These amendments will have the effect of bleaching the state of Florida, as it was before 1992, when minorities did not have the ability to elect candidates of their choice.

ALLEN: Miami Republican Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart knows a lot about redistricting. As a member of the state legislature in 2002, he helped draw a new congressional district in South Florida, that he then ran for and won. He's now helping lead a $4 million campaign to defeat the amendments supported by the state chamber of commerce and other business groups.

Diaz-Balart says the redistricting amendments would dilute the minority vote, and he has a key ally, Democratic Congresswoman Corinne Brown, an African- American who's represented a district in North Florida for nearly 20 years. But groups that have long worked for minority voting rights in Florida, including the NAACP, reject that argument and say it's just an attempt by incumbent politicians to hold onto their seats.

Leon Russell, legislative chairman for the NAACP in Florida, notes that African-Americans currently hold three congressional seats in the state. If voters approve these amendments, he believes African-Americans could do even better in the next redistricting.

LEON RUSSELL: If the districts are drawn properly, it's possible that you could come up with a fourth one, if they're drawn properly.

ALLEN: A similar fight over the redistricting process is also on the ballot in November in California. These are some of the opening salvos in a battle over how congressional and legislative districts will be redrawn in some of our largest and most politically important states.

Greg Allen, NPR News, Miami.

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