The regional hearings are complete and the pencils are sharpened, ready to redraw the district lines for 42 Senate and 70 House seats, along with three congressional and five PRC (remember them?) seats. Well, almost ready. This is tricky business.
The history of redistricting in New Mexico is not a pretty one, although it is softball compared to Texas. Still, lawsuits abound. Before 1963, the NM Senate had one Senator for every county, giving tiny Harding County the same representation as bustling Bernalillo. From 1970- 2001 a series of lawsuits seeking to uphold the one person one vote guarantee in the constitution – and protect the rights of the state’s minority groups-- have been filed, sometimes with the court drawing the lines, sometimes triggering special sessions and special elections.
This time, we hope to avoid the expense and acrimony of these once-every-ten-year law suits, uphold the Voting Rights Act and honor the population shifts that have occurred since 2000. That’s our task—a tall order, not even counting the partisan element…or the Governor’s veto pen.
Here’s the bottom line (s):
*The population of the state has grown by 13% in the past ten years. But it has grown unevenly, with some areas of the state exploding and others not keeping pace. The North east and East side of the state, especially, has declined in population, while Rio Rancho and the West Side of Albuquerque has exploded. And while the West Side grew (accounting for 40% of all the growth in NM) the center of the city and the Heights did not.
*The Hispanic population of the state has grown more than other groups during the past ten years. Hispanics now make up 46% of the population, up 5% from ten years ago.
*At first blush the population shifts should mean the loss of legislative seats on the east side, and in the center of Albuquerque, with new seats emerging on the West Side and Rio Rancho
*But, speaking of blushing, partisan advantage—and incumbent protection-- are legitimate parts of the game. The majority party will want to maintain its seats, and the minority will want more competitive districts so it can achieve parity.
Ten years ago, the population dynamics were basically the same. In the Senate, former President Pro-Temp Richard Romero engineered a compromise between Democrats and Republicans that did not eliminate seats in the East and essentially stretched districts toward the population growth—on the West Side of Albuquerque. It preserved incumbents, and essentially maintained the status quo.
The Senate passed it in the regular session in 2002, and Gov. Johnson signed it. It was the only legislative or congressional plan not to go to court in 2001.
Our failure to accommodate population changes in 2001, makes the imbalance of situation more flagrant today. There’s enough population now on the West Side of Albuquerque to create two new Senate districts (ideal population of each senate district about 49,000) and on the East Side they are short almost a third of a Senate seat. Albuquerque’s Heights also is short population—over a half of a Senate district.
Redistricting is a world unto itself which is why many are concerned about the Governor’s move to include a dozen other items on the short, special session’s agenda. A ban on fireworks during extreme drought seems important to me, but the Gov. also wants to revisit some of her educational reforms, drivers licenses, and the capital outlay that was bill killed in the final Senate Filibuster by Sen. John Ryan. There are other items as well., prompting the Las Cruces Sun News and others to call for a single issue session.
This time it’s much easier for the public to get involved with redistricting through the legislative web site at www.nmlegis.gov/lcs/redcensus/ There you can access maps, census data, various proposals and even see videocasts of the meetings the redistricting committee held around the state. You can even design your own map!
I’ll be keeping you up to date on how the redistricting proposals affect Sen District 13 as the process unfolds. For now, the short story is that – due to infill—we have kept pace with growth in other parts of the state so we may not need to change drastically.
Comments