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Group renews push for redistricting panel with a new petition

By ADAM C. SMITH
Published September 23, 2005

ST. PETERSBURG - Advocates for yanking the power to draw political districts from legislators are starting over on one of the ballot initiatives they botched.

Former state Education Commissioner Betty Castor said Thursday the group pushing for an independent redistricting commission will start collecting signatures for a new ballot question to replace one that state election officials rejected because it was six words too long.

Starting fresh makes more sense than focusing on a legal fight to include the six words, said Castor, one of the honorary leaders of the Committee for Fair Elections.

The bipartisan committee, heavily funded by the watchdog group Common Cause, has launched a citizen initiative with three ballot questions that could fundamentally alter elections in Florida. One measure would create a 15-member commission to draw congressional and legislative districts; another would require a new map be drawn for the 2008 elections; and a third would set new standards for drawing districts, including requiring they be compact, competitive and favor no single candidate or party.

But the St. Petersburg Times found that the third petition, already signed by more than 200,000 people, contained 81 words, when it was required to be 75 or less. That led Secretary of State Glenda Hood to reject the petition rather than send it to the state Supreme Court for final review.

The committee went to court to try and force Hood to send the petition on, but lost in Leon Circuit Court on Tuesday.

"My colleagues and I are all of the mind that we should not pursue trying to get this to the Supreme Court," Castor told the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club Thursday.

She said they are confident that the most important of the petition questions, the one that would create the independent redistricting commission, will be successful.

Obtaining the required 611,000 signatures on the revised petition may be tough by the Feb. 1 deadline, advocates agreed. But it's more efficient to start the process while signature gatherers are already out working. The committee also may contact people who signed the rejected petition.

"We can go back and capture all of the e-mail addresses and all the names and addresses of everyone who signed so we will try to go back and try to get the fourth petition on its way," she said.

Ben Wilcox, executive director of Common Cause Florida and chairman of Committee for Fair Elections, said the new petition should make it onto the 2008 ballot.

Castor, a Democrat who ran unsuccessfully for U.S. Senate last year, joined University of South Florida St. Petersburg political scientist Darryl Paulson in touting the need for independent redistricting to Tiger Bay members.

Paulson, a registered Republican, said that for years he opposed the idea but came to see that such a method is the only way to restore competitiveness to political races.

"When not one incumbent in Florida was defeated in 2004, something is wrong with the process. When 75 percent of the legislative races have no challengers in Florida, something is wrong with the process," said Paulson. "Politicians no longer have to pay attention to their constituents, because they know they're going to be re-elected. If you don't have fear of electoral defeat, you no longer have accountability with your politicians."

The Committee for Fair Elections includes some prominent Republican leaders, including former Comptroller Bob Milligan and state GOP lawyer Thom Rumberger. But Gov. Jeb Bush and the state GOP oppose the measure.

Andy Palmer, executive director of the state party, said the problem for Democrats is not redistricting but unappealing candidates and messages. He called the measure a "power grab by the Democrats" but said the party had not devised a plan to fight it yet.

"At this point," Palmer said, "things like 81 words with a 75-word limit is all the defense we need."

[Last modified September 23, 2005, 02:50:29]