Eleven months after the Census Bureau released the results of the nation’s 2010 decennial census, Florida’s reapportionment process has just now begun to take shape. Since early 2011, special reapportionment committees of the Florida Legislature have slowly and laboriously held public hearings throughout the state, accepted and digested draft maps, and solicited comments from citizens and interest groups. Today, state Senate staff released initial proposed maps, the first concrete proposals to come from either chamber.
While the protection of minority-centric districts has been most notable in coverage of the process so far, two important new factors also weigh heavily on the process. In 2010, Floridians adopted two initiatives as amendments to the Florida Constitution. The amendments prohibit the favoring or disfavoring of any political parties in the drawing of state legislative or congressional districts, preclude any diminution in the equal opportunity of minorities to participate in the political process, and require that districts be as compact, contiguous, and evenly populated as possible. They are being challenged through lawsuits by members of Congress and the state legislature on federal constitutional grounds, but these new constitutional provisions will have a dramatic impact on district boundaries and subject the redistricting plans that are ultimately adopted by the Legislature to many rounds of legal challenge.
Second, Florida’s gain of 2 seats in the United States House of Representatives is both a blessing and a curse. With 27 members of Congress, Florida’s delegation becomes an even stronger voice for the state’s interests on Capitol Hill. Yet, because the state’s Hispanic population has grown by 57% in the past decade to now over 22% of the overall population, lawmakers will be challenged to draw the state’s two new districts without diminishing the voting strength of minorities in other congressional districts or disenfranchising blacks that comprise 14% of Florida’s population.
Eyes now turn to Tallahassee where, in January, the Florida Legislature opens its session with the tremendous responsibility of fashioning a redistricting plan that satisfies the new constitutional provisions. As the coming winter gives way to spring, Florida’s lawmakers may regret not better utilizing calendar year 2011 — a full year before the 2012 general election — to enact district boundaries with sufficient time for the court challenges that will follow their enactment. The country’s largest swing state can ill-afford electoral drama, in 2012 or ever again.
