League of Women Voters of --Lower Merion and Narberth--

HARRISBURG – Governor Edward G. Rendell today urged the chairmen of the House and Senate State Government committees to consider legislation that would change how Pennsylvania redraws its legislative district boundaries following the federal census.

"The Commonwealth's existing redistricting process undermines democracy by institutionalizing a powerful system of incumbent protection," Governor Rendell wrote in a letter to Sens. Anthony H. Williams (D-Philadelphia) and Jeffrey Piccola (R-Dauphin), and Reps. Babette Josephs (D-Philadelphia) and Mathew E. Baker (R-Bradford). "For every vote to truly count, we must have competitive elections where voters have the opportunity to choose between viable candidates. I am convinced that the only way to ensure meaningful elections is to take politics out of the process of drawing legislative boundaries.

"This issue is neither arcane nor academic; how we draw legislative boundaries impacts the daily lives of Pennsylvanians because competitive elections in rationally drawn districts are the only way that voters can make their voices heard on the issues that matter to them," he said.

This is not the first time the Governor has called for drastic change in the state's redistricting process. More than a year ago, at an appearance before the Pennsylvania Press Club, Governor Rendell called for creation of a nine-member citizens' commission that would be charged with redrawing legislative boundaries.

With the citizens' commission, districts would be required to be drawn based on population; deviations from the most populous to the least populous would not be greater than 8 percent, he said. Also, counties, cities, towns, boroughs and incorporated towns would not be divided unless it became unavoidable.

While emphasizing in today's letter that his support for redistricting is not a criticism of any legislator or legislative body, he again said, "…people should be choosing their representatives, not the other way around."

By acting now on bills pending before the General Assembly, the Governor said redistricting reform would make it possible to amend the Pennsylvania Constitution and allow changes to be made before district borders are redrawn following the 2010 U.S. Census.

Legislative reapportionment wasn't the only thing the Governor said lawmakers needed to reform last year. He also said changes needed to be made to give the public and the media a wider look at the business functions of state government.

In February, after working with the General Assembly, Governor Rendell signed Senate Bill 1 into law and drastically improved the public's access to state government records. In April, the Governor appointed Terry Mutchler to lead the new Office of Open Records created under the new law.

EDITOR'S NOTE: A copy of the Governor's letter follows:

Dear Chairmen:

I am writing to express my strong support for redistricting reform legislation such as the bills that are currently in your committees. Timely consideration of redistricting reform will make it possible to amend the Constitution in time to make necessary improvements before the redistricting that follows the 2010 Census.

The Commonwealth's existing redistricting process undermines democracy by institutionalizing a powerful system of incumbent protection. For every vote to truly count, we must have competitive elections where voters have the opportunity to choose between viable candidates. I am convinced that the only way to ensure meaningful elections is to take politics out of the process of drawing legislative boundaries. Geographic compactness and population distribution, not the interests of any person or political party, should be the driving forces behind reapportionment. We should strive to create districts in which the population has a commonality of interests.

This issue is neither arcane nor academic; how we draw legislative boundaries impacts the daily lives of Pennsylvanians because competitive elections in rationally drawn districts are the only way that voters can make their voices heard on the issues that matter to them. Consider the case of the Poconos, where six State Senators share representation for Monroe County – with districts that stretch as far north as the New York border or as far south as Berks County.

I want to emphasize that my support for redistricting reform is not a criticism of any legislator or legislative body. As I told the Pennsylvania Press Club in March 2007 when I called for reapportionment to be conducted by a bipartisan citizen's commission: "The people should be choosing their representatives, not the other way around."

I hope that your consideration will allow Pennsylvania voters the opportunity to decide for themselves in time for the next reapportionment whether the current system is in their best interests.

Sincerely,

Edward G. Rendell, Governor

CONTACT: Chuck Ardo 717-783-1116

*****

Here's the June 11th, 2008 response to Representative Babette Josephs who pulled 2420 Redistricting Reform (source: Philadelphia Inquirer): Letters, Readers Respond

Josephs has it wrong on redistricting

The June 4 letter ("Reform in name only") from Rep. Babette Josephs (D., Phila.) attempts to explain why she, as chair of the House State Government Committee, blocked a vote on an essential redistricting reform bill. Regrettably, her letter contains numerous errors and omissions.
H.B. 2420 would depoliticize redistricting by putting the nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau in charge. The bureau's director claims his staff lacks necessary skills. But in Iowa, which uses the model for nonpartisan redistricting on which H.B. 2420 is based, one attorney, one computer systems specialist, and one temporary data worker - employees of the Legislative Services Agency - carry out redistricting.

If Pennsylvania's geography requires additional mapping expertise, the bureau could hire experts from state universities.

The director fears redistricting would compromise the nonpartisan reputation of the bureau. H.B. 2420, however, rules out partisan maneuvers such as considering recent voting patterns, voter registration data, and incumbents' addresses in drawing district lines. In addition, the transparency of the process will demonstrate impartiality.

Josephs wrongly claims the bill gives "a bureaucrat full authority to make hundreds of critical decisions." H.B. 2420 requires consultation with an advisory commission, a public record of all redistricting communications, widespread publication of proposed plans, and public hearings throughout the state.

Josephs says she is willing to "examine alternative proposals." However, time is running out to reform the system for the 2011 round of redistricting. Reform organizations and 93 lawmakers, cosponsors of H.B. 2420, stand ready to work with Josephs to give Pennsylvanians fairer representation in the next decade's elections.

Sara Steelman,State chair, Common Cause/PA

Andrea Mulrine, State president
League of Women Voters
Harrisburg

*****

Here's the letter from Babette Josephs who pulled the redistricting bill

June 11, 2008

Letter transmitted via E-Mail

Dear Interested Parties:

Thank you for contacting me about House Bill 2420, legislation designed to take the politics out of the redistricting process.

I, like you, want reform in the General Assembly to move forward, and I share your frustration with legislative and congressional districts that are clearly drawn to protect one particular person or one party. But we must make sure that what we are doing does not create unintended problems that are worse than what we now have.

I first listed House Bill 2420 for a committee vote, because it was endorsed by organizations for which I have great respect: the League of Women Voters and Common Cause. It was not until I had thoroughly analyzed the proposal and discussed it with experts that I realized it was fatally flawed. I predicted that such a bill might not even be reported out of the State Government Committee. In fact, a similar bill was tabled by the Senate State Government Committee just last week. I judged that such a defeat would seriously set reform back, so I removed it from our agenda.

I enclose the letter I wrote to the Inquirer explaining my position.

As someone cleverly said: The voters should be selecting the office holders; the office holders should not be selecting the voters. I agree.

Yours, Babette Joseph

*****

Source: Post-Gazette

A call to action
Time is short to reform Pennsylvania's corrupted process for drawing legislative districts
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
By Suzanne Broughton
Election districts in Pennsylvania are a sight to behold. In the Pittsburgh region, Legislative District 16 starts in Beaver County and snakes down through part of Franklin Park, part of Ross and Bellevue, finally ending at the river's edge. Districts 20 and 21 each include parts of Ross and Reserve and several city wards. These monstrosities ostensibly were created to eliminate District 29, punishing its then-incumbent for defying the state House leadership.

Suzanne Broughton is president of the League of Women Voters of Greater Pittsburgh (palwv.org/pittsburgh). Here you can see current district maps.
Ross is divided among four House districts. Other municipalities, such as Bethel Park, Collier, Robinson, Plum and South Fayette, are split between two districts.

How does this happen? Every 10 years after the U.S. census, redistricting is done to account for population shifts. It is a hotly partisan insider's game that is ignored by most citizens. The Pennsylvania Constitution gives legislative leaders (who also lead their respective political parties) exclusive power to draw General Assembly district boundaries. Because the process is bipartisan, the outcome usually is fair to both parties overall. However, these leaders can and do collude to create safe districts for incumbents and party members, and to occasionally punish a legislator. This is known as bipartisan gerrymandering.

Gerrymandering makes elections less competitive, which breeds voter apathy and reduces civic participation. Why become involved when the result is predetermined? Why volunteer or vote? Why become a candidate to lose?

Gerrymandering also contributes to the division and gridlock dominating political discourse in recent years. When a safe district disenfranchises the opposing party, favored candidates have no need to reach out to swing voters or engage in the bipartisan negotiation and compromise often needed to solve pressing problems, such as access to quality education or affordable health care.

To correct this situation requires a constitutional amendment, which entails a long process. A bill to amend the state constitution must pass two sessions of the Legislature and then be approved by voters. For this to happen in time for the redistricting after the 2010 census, a bill must pass by the end of this month (because of some constitutionally mandated legal advertising that must occur this fall).

Two bills to accomplish this currently languish in the Legislature. Senate Bill 346 has been tabled by the Senate State Government Committee. House Bill 2420 has been removed from the agenda of the House State Government Committee.

These bills would require that the Pennsylvania Legislative Reference Bureau draw district lines using strict criteria for mapping, transparency and public input. Public input would be coordinated by a five-member temporary Redistricting Advisory Commission, which could not include current office holders or anyone related to or employed by members of Congress or the General Assembly. The General Assembly would vote on the plan under a rule prohibiting amendments.

No district could be drawn for the purpose of favoring a political party, incumbent legislator or member of Congress or other person. Data concerning voter registration and voter performance, as well as home addresses of legislators, could not be considered.

Now is the time for Pennsylvanians to demand true reform with the passage of one of these bills. The League of Women Voters of Greater Pittsburgh knows that if maps can be drawn to create political advantage, they can also be drawn to promote fairness and democracy.

Contact your state representatives and senators today and voice your support for HB 2420 and for identical language in 346. Visit www.palwv.org to find out how to contact your legislators and for additional information. Time is running out.

*****

Thanks to LWV Chesco for a great Redistricting Forum!

SATURDAY, APRIL 5:

IMPORTANT CITIZEN'S FORUM ON REDISTRICTING!

CO-SPONSORED BY LWV CHESTER COUNTY & AAUW

When: 10 a.m., Saturday, April 5
Where: West Chester Borough Hall, 401 E. Gay Street,
West Chester, PA 19380

Subject: Pending legislation which all PA citizens need to demand be passed this session so we can end gerrymandered voting districts and instead draw voting district lines so everyone's votes count. Time is of the essence: if it is not passed by this June, there can be no reform until the 2020 Census!

Our Panel includes Representatives McIlvaine-Smith, Rubley, & Schroder

The video of this forum is available for sale at PCN (PA Cable Network), pcntv.com. You may also be able to view it on the PCN website. Email: pcntv@pcntv.com

The Redistricting Forum presented by the LWV of Centre County was a great success and well attended. Excellent news coverage by the Centre Daily Times, as always. To link to this article click here or read below.

This article is from the Centre Daily Times, published on Friday, Mar. 28, 2008

Click here to visit the Centre Daily times
Forum targets gerrymandering
By Dena Pauling - dpauling@centredaily.com
BOALSBURG — Health care, education, roads and bridges — if voters care about these topics but wonder why they aren't addressed by their representatives, the answer often traces back to gerrymandering.

“Most political people will have two constituencies. They will have the voting constituency and the funding constituency,” said Barry Kauffman, executive director of Common Cause PA. “When they don’t have to worry about their voting constituency because of redistricting, they focus on the funding constituency and that is often what drives regular folks crazy, because they can’t understand why the issues they really care about don’t get dealt with.”

The discussion surfaced Thursday night at a forum sponsored by the League of Women Voters of Centre County that was meant to raise awareness about gerrymandering — drawing legislative districts so as to support a certain candidate or political party.

Four state bills to correct the problem have been introduced but haven’t moved much in the last year.

Andrea Mulrine, president of the state League of Women Voters, said moving the legislation forward is her organization’s top priority this spring.

Mulrine, Kauffman, Tim Potts, executive director of Democracy Rising; Rep. Mike Hanna, D-Lock Haven; Rep. Kerry Benninghoff, R-Bellefonte and Rep. Scott Conklin, D-Rush Township were the forum panel. All said they want to change the redistricting process.

One name plate at the table bore Sen. Jake Corman’s name. But the chair reserved for the Republican lawmaker from Benner Township — the highest ranking state legislator in the county — was vacant. Corman attended the county Republican Party’s annual Lincoln Day Dinner instead.

The panel shared jaw-dropping examples of how the process works. After a census every 10 years, a commission redraws districts lines with about the same number of people in each district.

“The four legislative leaders pick the members that serve on the commission and, in fact, I think they normally pick themselves,” said Hanna, who has been in office for two redistricting periods. “And then they have a designee who all work behind closed doors and propose these various plans that are passed back and forth among the leaders.”

Further troubling, Kauffman said, is that lawmaker’s homes are plugged onto the map and voter data is used to spot trends.

“They draw the safe district for each incumbent who has been a good boy or a good girl,” he said. “... It’s a very vicious process.”

In April, the number of candidates who don’t have opponents is “four to five times as great as the number who do have opponents,” Potts said.

“This is not a coincidence,” he said. “This is by design.”

Benninghoff, a member of the state government committee in which the bills have been assigned, said he is working on another piece of legislation to correct the issue. Some bills would allow the General Assembly to amend a redistricting plan — something Benninghoff opposes.

There are “less than 90 days,” Hanna said, to change the process before the next redistricting after the 2010 census. Legislative action must be accomplished by the end of June to get a constitutional amendment process started.

“Democracy is not a spectator sport and we need to be involved,” Mulrine said.

This was the news release for this event:

!!REDISTRICTING FORUM NEWS RELEASE!!

Legislators and Top Reform Advocates To Discuss Gerrymandering Reform in PA

(State College, PA) - The League of Women Voters of Centre County (LWVCC) has announced a forum with state legislators and Pennsylvania’s top advocates of reform to discuss what the Pennsylvania legislature should do in 2008 to reform gerrymandering – the practice of dividing legislative and congressional districts to give an unfair advantage to one party.

The forum, “Democracy Denied: Pennsylvania’s Gerrymandered Election Districts,” will feature a panel of central Pennsylvania legislators including Senate Republican policy chairman Jake Corman, State House Reform Committee member Representative Kerry Benninghoff (R), and State Representatives Scott Conklin (D) and Mike Hanna (D). Also participating will be two top reform advocates, Common Cause – PA Executive Director Barry Kauffman and Democracy Rising Executive Director Tim Potts.

The Pennsylvania League of Women Voters officially advocates legislative action this year to create an independent commission to redistrict after the 2010 census, rather than allowing legislators to redistrict their own districts.

LWVCC President Candace Dannaker calls safe districts -- districts with an unfair advantage for one party -- “the root cause of many of our problems with government today, including the polarization and paralysis of the legislature and disenfranchisement of a large percentage of registered voters.”

The forum will be held on at Thursday, March 27, 2008, at 7:30 PM at the Mount Nittany Middle School, 656 Brandywine Drive, State College, PA 16801. The forum will be televised by the Pennsylvania Cable Network and by local cable channel C-Net. The public is encouraged to attend and participate in the discussion and to post comments on a blog set up by the Centre Daily Times on redistricting reform at http://www.centredaily.com/opinion/blogs/

For more information on the forum, contact forum moderator Christopher Lee at 814-466-9266 or forum organizer Nancy Crane at 814-238-0467 or nlcrane@comcast.net.

WHY CARE ABOUT “GERRYMANDERING” (manipulating of voting districts)?

LOSS OF VOTING POWER
Even when you vote, you really lose your Constitutional right to choose,
because the politicians ensure their own re-election and expand their own political power.

LOW VOTER TURNOUT
Since the outcome of the election is pretty much predetermined, apathy sets in and people don’t bother coming out.

POLITICAL POLARIZATION
Since the outcome of the election is pretty much predetermined, the candidates don’t need to reach out to independents or voters from the other party. This leads to extreme rhetoric and squabbling from office holders who are out of touch with mainstream Pennsylvanians.

UNRESPONSIVE REPRESENTION
Politicians assured of re-election stop listening to their constituents.
They vote themselves:
High salaries
Generous healthcare plans
Pensions four times higher than the private sector.
ALL PAID WITH OUR TAX DOLLARS!

WE NEED REFORMS
We have one of the worst “open records” laws in the nation.
Lobbying gifts, meals, travel, and entertainment go unchecked to the politicians.

How can gerrymandering be stopped?

REDISTRICTING REFORM!!!

Contact your Pennsylvania State Senators & Representatives to demand the passing of Reformed Redistricting Legislation by June 2008.

If not, we’ll have ten more years of blank checks for the politicians.

LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS OF PENNSYLVANIA REDISTRICTING
(excerption from LWVPA’s, President, Andrea Mulrine’s, Op-Ed 1/17/08)

To Donate money for LWV PA Redistricting Campaign, go to:
http://www.palwv.org/lwv/support.html