Pushed by the progressive left, Fair Districts' reforms collided with minority interests at the state's redistricting road show in Central Florida.
Lawmakers were caught in the middle in Orlando last week when Hispanics and African-Americans demanded that the Legislature carve out legislative and congressional districts for them.
Emilio Perez, chairman of the Central Florida Redistricting Council, told legislators that failure to draw a Hispanic-heavy congressional district would "be like penalizing us for the growth that landed this state two new congressional districts."
The Rev. Randolph Bracy Jr., former president of the Orange branch of the NAACP, argued that a congressional seat should be drawn to elect a black representative.
Hispanic and African-American groups are banking on the 46-year-old federal Voting Rights Act to boost minority representation at the state Legislature and Congress. Florida is among the Southern states whose redistricting plans must obtain race-based "preclearance" from the U.S. Department of Justice.
But despite an ongoing influx of Hispanics, it's unclear whether Central Florida has either the requisite minority population or geographic concentration to construct such ethnic districts according to the Fair Districts guidelines.
Under Fair Districts amendments, approved by Florida voters last November, redistricting plans cannot --
- Favor incumbents.
- Favor any political party.
- Deny equal opportunity to minorities.
- Vary district population size.
- Stray from existing political and geographic boundaries.
- Divide districts or fail to make them compact.
"When legislators confront these dilemmas, it wont be altogether clear how they should proceed," said Bill Mattox of the James Madison Institute, a conservative think tank in Tallahassee.
"In fact, the new guidelines explicitly reject criteria ranking except to say that the first three considerations are more important than the last three," Mattox said.
The DOJ has been no help in establishing a hierarchy of priorities, let alone deciphering what "equal opportunity" for minorities actually means. Federal attorneys issued only a bureaucratic, two-paragraph response to the Legislature's request for guidance.
Based on their groups' population gains, Hispanic and African-American activists say Central Florida's current political boundaries are out of whack. The region has one black state senator, one Hispanic state representative and one black state representative.
U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, an African-American, represents a gerrymandered district that runs north from Orlando to Jacksonville. Her CD 3 is considered a prime example of racial districting, as it picks up minority communities along the interior of the First Coast.
Similarly tortured lines -- the very kind that Fair Districts was designed to erase -- would be required to establish designated Hispanic and black districts in Central Florida.
"Bottom line, there aren't enough [legal] Hispanic citizens in Central Florida to even have a state Senate seat, much less a congressional seat," said Doug Guetzloe, a veteran political operative based in Orlando.
"Corrine, of course, wants to keep minorities corralled into the most gerrymandered district in America, but I predict she will be unsuccessful," he said.
As for the expected additional congressional seat in the region, Guetzloe said Republican U.S. Reps. "Daniel Webster, Sandy Adams, John Mica and Bill Posey all want to lump Democrats, blacks and Hispanics into one new 60-plus percent Democratic district as a safety valve."
He predicts that the new district will encompass central Orlando south to Osceola County, taking in the heavily Hispanic Buena Ventura Lakes, Winter Garden, Winter Park and Eatonville.
"Even then, blacks will only be 10 percent and the registered Hispanics about 10 percent," Guetzloe said.
With decidedly blue demographics, Central Florida's new congressional seat would be tailor-made for a comeback by Alan Grayson. The Democrat who was ousted from his 8th Congressional District seat by Webster last year has said he would consider another run.
But using Fair Districts' guidelines, legislators could go in another direction and draw a CD more favorable to a Republican.
That's the hope of Karen Diebel, who has already raised nearly $100,000 for the yet-to-be-named 26th Congressional District. Diebel finished less than a percentage point behind Adams in the GOP primary for CD 24 last year.
Meanwhile, the Orlando Sentinel quoted New York-based Latino Justice as proposing a 46 percent Hispanic district that would include eastern and southern Orange, northern Osceola and northwest Polk County. The district would encompass parts of Kissimmee, St. Cloud and Haines City.
Juan Cartagena, a lawyer and director of the group, said a 50 percent or higher Hispanic district would be difficult to draw under Fair Districts' anti-gerrymandering rules. But he also told lawmakers it is legally impossible "to comply with the Voting Rights Act in a way that ignores Latinos in Central Florida."
Such sharp exchanges have typified the sometimes-raucous public-input hearings, but Will Weatherford, who chairs the House Redistricting Committee, said he appreciates the "diversity" of viewpoints expressed.
"If people want to say we're listening too much, we'll take that criticism. There will be plenty of time for people to review the maps," said Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel.
State Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, acknowledged at Wednesday's raucous meeting the "tension" between Fair Districts and gerrymandered districts designed to elect minorities.
Mattox agrees.
"The tension between the Fair Districts constitutional amendment and the 1965 Voting Rights Act is real -- and not accidental.Its part of a deliberate attempt to have all redistricting decisions ultimately made by the courts," he said.
Other observers note the historic irony of liberals squabbling among themselves.
Progressive groups, including labor unions and trial lawyers, spent $4.2 million to place Fair Districts on the 2010 ballot. Now minority activists, who typically serve as political allies, see Fair Districts as a potential impediment to establishing Hispanic and black districts.
Florida Republicans capitalized on the same internal split two decades ago to strike a deal with African-American lawmakers to create a handful of "safe" black legislative and congressional districts while leaving the majority of seats for the GOP.
But Fair Districts has dealt a whole new set of cards this year, says Bob Sanchez, policy director at JMI.
"Legislators were left with a set of redistricting standards so confusing and contradictory that any plans they might devise for new legislative and congressional districts are certain to be challenged in court on some basis or other.
"Its akin to asking a milling group of teenagers to line up alphabetically by height," he said.
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Reach Kenric Ward at kward@sunshinestatenews.com or at (772) 559-4719.
