Behind closed curtains

Behind the curtain, Republicans in the process of making "sausage"

Today the product of months of backroom deals, corruption, and the good old boy mentality produced a disgrace and an illegal state legislative district map. The process of redistricting needs to be drastically reformed to take politicians whether they are Republican or Democrat out of the direct process of making legislative districts. 

 You are allowing the politicians to choose their voters, instead of allowing the voters to choose their elected officials! It is like putting a cookie jar in a room with toddlers and expecting them not to eat the cookies. Of course they are going to eat the cookies, and of course the politicians are going to gerrymander the districts to serve their purposes and not the purposes of the people of New Jersey!

 On March 31 I had the opportunity to be in both the Republican and the Democrat meeting rooms where they were creating the districts they wanted in the new map. Both rooms had about a dozen computers each, compared to Bayshore with a pencil, notepad, and a calculator. The only reason you need a dozen computers is to evade the redistricting requirements under the law.

A gerrymandered and illegal legislative map

Map Published by Minority Coalition is Just Gerrymandering by Another Name

On Wednesday, the New Jersey Legislative Redistricting Coalition unveiled a legislative districting map that they claim will increase chances for minorities to be elected to the state legislature. (“Minority coalition releases redistricting map,” PolitickerNJ, March 23, 2011.) However, there is one word to describe their map: gerrymandering.

Viewing all of the fascinating shapes that the group conjured for the districts on their map, it appears that they made no attempt, whatsoever, to conform the map to three important requirements of the New Jersey Constitution:

• Compactness
• Contiguity, and
• Not dividing counties more than necessary.

The most blatant violation on their map is the Sixth District, which slithers its way from Brigantine on the Atlantic, to Haddon, right next to Camden. At most points, the borders of the district, from north to south, consist of only a single town. Along the way, in order to connect the towns from the Atlantic, to almost the Delaware, it picks up Washington Township, in Burlington County, a very large town in the Pine Barrens, but, in which, only 687 people reside. There are no other towns within the district to the north or south of Washington before it connects with Hammonton on the west and Galloway and Port Republic on the east.

The group’s Eleventh District presents another classic example of gerrymandering. It begins in Matawan and Old Bridge on the Raritan Bay, but ends in Mansfield in Burlington County, only miles from the Delaware River. In another intriguing twist, it separates Matawan from Aberdeen Township, included in the map’s Thirteenth District. Most residents of Matawan and Aberdeen, which together form the Matawan-Aberdeen Regional School District, would consider this division to be bizarre. Although these are the most brazen examples of gerrymandering, numerous others exist throughout the map.

Furthermore, the map splits a number of counties into more districts than allowed by the New Jersey Constitution. For example, Bergen County, with around 905,000 people, should be split into no more than five districts under the New Jersey Constitution. However, the Coalition’s map splits Bergen into seven districts. Middlesex should be constitutionally split into four districts, but the Coalition’s map also splits the county into seven. Monmouth ideally should be split into three districts. The Coalition map: five. Again, these are just a few examples.

Overall, the district lines drawn by the New Jersey Legislative Redistricting Coalition are so absurd that their map should not receive any consideration by the New Jersey Apportionment Commission. The people of New Jersey will no longer tolerate a gerrymandered map. Let’s follow the New Jersey Constitution. Doing so will help assure that the votes of everyone in New Jersey will count. It will give all of our state’s citizens, including minorities, the opportunity to choose responsive representatives in fair elections.

Minority coalition releases redistricting map

Via PolitickerNJ:

A coalition of minority groups Wednesday released their version of a legislative map as they look to boost the opportunities for minority representation in the state legislature.

The map, which was created by the New Jersey Legislative Redistricting Coalition, would maintain the number of existing "majority minority: districts and double the number of so-called coalition districts, where minorities make up a majority of voters but no one group holds a majority, would double from 7 to 14.

“We believe that our map reflects the 2010 U.S. Census and speaks to the realities in all communities across the State of New Jersey,” said Jerry Harris, Co-Chairman of the Coalition and Chairman of the New Jersey Black Issues Convention. “The Coalition is hopeful that the State Apportionment Commission will consider our map and accept the fact that African Americans, Asians and Hispanics now represent more than 40% of our State’s population. Our map increases the opportunities for New Jersey’s legislature to better reflect its broad and diverse population.”

Among the changes advocated by the group would be a combined district that includes Perth Amboy, New Brunswick, Edison, Metuchen and Woodbridge, which would pit state Sens. Barbara Buono and Joe Vitale in a primary.  The coalition map would combine Vineland and Atlantic City into a new 2nd District. The combination of these two cities would create a district where Latinos, blacks and Asians would make up 53 percent of the district population allowing for more opportunity for minority representatives.