Senate counters attack on its redistricting maps

The Republican-led Florida Senate shot back Friday on the three-barrel attack by the NAACP, a coalition of voters group and the Florida Democratic Party with a 106-page brief that attempts to counter claims that the Florida Supreme Court should reject the second Senate redistricting plan and rewrite it themselves.

The court is scheduled to hear the case a week from today and it will then have 30 days to decide to accept or reject the maps or 60 days to write them itself. As a bit of a reminder of the ticking time limits between now the candidate qualifying, which will take place June 4-8, in time for the Aug. 14 primary, Secretary of State Ken Detzner filed a memo to the court that outlined the election year deadlines.

The Senate argues that the alternative map offered by the Democrats “engineers Democratic districts” because it achieves a 20-20 partisan balance and diminished the ability of Hispanics in South Florida to elect candidates of their choice.

The Democrats had argued, in its brief filed April 10, that despite the court’s March 9 ruling that provided a road map for fixing the Senate’s first flawed map, the new version “is still replete with evidence of an intent to favor incumbents and the dominant political party.’’

Legislature seeks federal redistricting review even without a final map

The Florida Legislature’s legal team has asked the U.S. Department of Justice to begin the process of reviewing its legislative maps for compliance with the federal Voting Rights Act, even before the Florida Supreme Court signs off on a final product.

In a March 30 letter to the U.S. Department of Justice, lawyers for the House, Senate and attorney general asked the federal government to expedite its a pre-clearance of the maps so that candidates will know the district boundaries when they are required to qualify during the week the June 4. Download Preclearance_Senate

Under the Section 5 of the federal Voting Rights Act, Florida must submit its legislative and congressional maps for approval, or pre-clearance, because five counties – Collier, Hardee, Hendry, Hillsborough and Monroe – have a history of discrimination against racial or language minorities.

Dem's proposed map that creates 13-11 GOP majority in Congress

A Herald/Times analysis of the new congressional map submitted Monday in Leon County Circuit Court shows that the proposed districts would create 13 Republican-leaning districts, 11 Democrat-leaning districts and 3 swing districts. That compares to the map created by the Legislature that creates 16 GOP-leaning districts and 9 Democrat-leading districts with only two swing districts.

More significantly, the map shifts the sprawling congressional district now held by U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown into a much more compact district, creates more minority districts than the Legislature's map and does it without reducting the minority population in Brown's map -- leaving it at 48.9 percent black voting age population.

Republicans have argued that the new Fair Districts amendments prevent the state from diminishing the opportunity for a black in Brown's sprawling district to elect a black, regardless of how many other minority seats are created in the rest of the state. How Circuit Judge Terry Lewis rules on this point could be pivotal.

The map was submitted as part of the Florida Democratic Party's lawsuit challenging the congressional plan. The Herald/Times analysis is based on voting data and elections results from the 2008 presidential race and the 2010 governor's race. A look at the proposed population data shows that the Democrat's proposal creates 7 minority majority districts including the following:

Democrats offer court alternative congressional map, target Brown's district

Pointing to a Florida Supreme Court ruling that rejected the legislatively-drawn state Senate map, Florida Democrats on Monday filed an alternative congressional map in Leon County Circuit Court and urged the court to quickly reject the Legislature’s plan.

“This is what a constitutionally valid map looks like,” said Florida Democratic Party Chairman Rod Smith in a statement. “The GOP, despite months of useless debate at an enormous cost to Florida taxpayers, has been unable to produce maps free of incumbent protection and partisan gerrymandering.”

The Democrat’s map focuses on making more compact the sprawling African American district now held by U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, D-Jacksonville, and in the process consolidates Orlando into two, instead of four districts. As if anticipating the assault on the district that now stretches over nine counties, Brown joined with Republican Congressman Mario Diaz Balart last year to challenge the Fair Districts amendment that resulted in the new anti-gerrymandering standards but the court rejected their argument.

The Democrat's plan also proposes keeping Hillsborough and Pinellas counties whole, rejecting the design sought by the Republican-led legislature that divides up both counties. The Democratic plan makes few changes, however, to the legislature’s proposals for South Florida.Download Romo Plaintiffs_ Motion for Summary Judgment[1]  Download Appendix.pdf - Adobe Acrobat Pro

Leon County Circuit Court Judge Terry Lewis is scheduled to conduct a hearing on the challenge to the legislature’s congressional map during the week of April 16. The Democratic Party sued on behalf of several individual voters as did a coalition of voters groups, including the League of Women Voters, the National Council of La Raza, and Common Cause of Florida. Lewis has consolidated the cases and said he has not decided whether or not he will rule on the maps now, or conduct a full hearing later in the year.

House set to 'rubber stamp' Senate map

The Florida House Redistricting Committee approved the Senate's fix to its rejected redistricting map on a party line vote Monday and sent it to the House floor where nothing is expected to change.

"I think it’s a significant improvement to the map that was passed before and I think it is in compliance,'' said House Redistricting Chairman Will Weatherford as the committee met to review the Senate map. The Legislature has until Wednesday to come up with a new Senate map after the Florida Supreme Court rejected its first try 5-2 on March 9.

Rep. Evan Jenne, D-Dania Beach, said he will propose an amendment to revise some areas of the map on when the proposal comes to a vote before the full House on Tuesday, but it's not expected to go anywhere.

"No one can deny it's a better map,'' Jenne said Monday. "While it is better, I'm not quite sure it gets us over the hump."

12 Senators win in the 'extended term' lottery include Margolis, Flores and Ring

The Florida Senate conducted it's first ever drawing for districts Wednesday complete with bingo-style balls and brass cages, and 14 incumbents won the lottery to extend their terms to 10 years beyond the eight-year term limits -- if voters choose to return them to office. The other 12 senators would get the maximum of eight years as a result of the drawing.

The winners in the extended terms lottery are: Don Gaetz, Bill Montford, Charlie Dean, Steve Oelrich, Thad Altman, Alan Hays, Nancy Detert, Jim Norman, Arthenia Joyner, Andy Gardiner or David Simmons, Jeremy Ring,  Gwen Margolis, and Anitere Flores.  Oscar Braynon, who was elected in March 2011, is the biggest winner with the potential to serve to a total of 11 years.

The Florida Constitution requires staggered terms for the Senate's 40 members but, in a reapportionment year, every district must have an election, so half the districts get a two-year term and the other half gets four. Those who have already served six year, like Gaetz, Oelrich and Ring, expected to be termed out of office in 2014 but now get two more years. (Oelrich, however, has announced he is running for the newly drawn congressional seat in North Florida so is unlikely to take advantage of the extended time.)

The Florida Supreme Court rejected the Senate's original numbering scheme because it gave nearly every returning incumbent a four-year term, an apparent violation of the new Fair Districts amendments, which forbids lawmakers from intentionally favoring incumbents. That prompted Gaetz to order up the bingo machines and conduct a Lotto-style drawing in the committee room Wednesday.

Here are the results of the drawing:

Gaetz map pits Gardiner and Simmons, Bogdanoff and Sachs against each other

Senate Redistricting Chairman Don Gaetz waded deeply into the Senate Leadership fight with a new map that leaves nearly all of the returning senators protected with the exception of Sen. Andy Gardiner and one of his closest allies, Sen. David Simmons.

According to a Herald/Times analysis, the two Orlando-based Republicans would be forced into the same district in the Gaetz plan. Also forced to run against each other or move is Sen. Maria Sachs, a Delray Beach Democrat, who is now in the same district as Sen. Ellyn Bogdnaoff, a Fort Lauderdale Republican.

The Senate leadership wars pit Gardiner against St. Augustine Republican John Thrasher and Stuart Republican Joe Negron for the 2014 Senate presidency. Gaetz is believed to be a Thrasher ally. Download Gaetz map description

Update: Simmons says he will move to Seminole County, denies the map was intended to influence the Senate leadership fight, claims that Thrasher has now conceded to Gardiner, and tells the Herald/Times that "the 2014 Senate presidency race is over." As for the 2016 fight between Sen. Jack Latvala and either Thrasher or Negron, that race is still a hot potato.

Gaetz's map continues to split Okaloosa County horizontally along I-10, except for the
city of Crestview, which is folded into Gaetz' District 3 to the south. He avoids a head-to-head match-up with Sen. Greg Evers', who also lives in Okaloosa County but remains in the District 1 seat that now includes all of Escambia County.

Gaetz releases his proposed Senate redistricting fix

The Florida Senate on Saturday released its first attempt at fixing its rejected Senate redistricting map with a proposal that appears to reconfigure districts in a such a way that top Senate leaders remain protected in their homes districts. (Stay tuned here for a complete Herald/Times analysis of the performance and incumbent placement of the proposed districts. We will be making live updates throughout the afternoon.)

The map, released by Senate Redistricting Chairman Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, is a response to a March 9 ruling by the Florida Supreme Court that threw out the Senate map and validated the House map based on the new redistricting standards approved by voters in 2010.  The proposal also seeks to ask the court to invalidate individual districts if it sees future problems, but allow the rest of the map go forward.

Gaetz's plan addresses the court's criticism of his district, by keeping Escambia County whole but it also includes an odd-shaped leg into Crestview to pick up voters for his district. The proposal, however, leaves the numbering system in place that the court said showed bias towards incumbents.

Hearing on newly drawn congressional maps set for April

The state Democratic Party and a coalition of voter groups hoping to invalidate newly drawn congressional districts will be allowed to make their case during a trial next month.

Circuit Judge Terry Lewis took no action on the House and the Senate's request to delay the lawsuit until after the fall election, though his decision to proceed with a hearing dealt the Republican-led chambers a blow. He also made no promises that he would rule on the case before November or be able to correct any issues he might find.

However, Lewis said he wants to at least attempt to address some of issues during a yet-to-be-scheduled trial the week of April 16, and he urged the parties to narrow the evidence that will be introduced. Candidates for Congress are scheduled to qualify June 4 through 8.

The outcome of that trial will depend heavily on the facts presented and how much common ground the two sides can reach, the judge said.

Lawmakers convene for expensive 11-minute session

It might have been the most expensive quorum call in the history of the Florida Legislature.

At a cost of tens of thousands of dollars, House members returned to the Capitol Wednesday for a session that lasted 11 minutes, and most of that was ceremonial.

Some South Florida lawmakers spent more than $1,000 for a round-trip plane ticket to Tallahassee, with taxpayers likely picking up the tab.

Story here

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