Speakers plead for responsible redistricting

People at a Tampa hearing urge those drawing new boundaries to rise above partisan politics.

By STEVE BOUSQUET

© St. Petersburg Times,
published August 28, 2001

TAMPA -- The people of Sun City Center, one of Florida's largest retirement communities, live, vote and pay property taxes in Hillsborough County. But when they want political help, they must rely on state legislators from Polk or Sarasota County, and their U.S. congressman is from Bradenton.

That was one curious result when Democrats redrew legislative districts a decade ago.

Dee Williams, a Sun City Republican leader, said her area's cohesiveness was "torn apart" in that 1992 reapportionment. She said the sprawling retirement haven near Interstate 75 "paid the price" for electing Republican Chris Corr to a House seat long held by Democrat "Spud" Clements.

"The most important thing I want to say to this committee today is that you do not play the same games that were played 10 years ago whereby the Democrats in control engaged in reckless partisan gerrymandering," Williams told members of the Legislature's redistricting committee at a hearing Monday.

Now, for the first time in Florida, it is the Republicans' turn to draw the boundaries, and many people in the Tampa Bay area have advice on how to do it differently.

More than 60 people took turns addressing lawmakers who must redraw district lines for congressional and legislative districts to reflect a 23.5 percent growth in population since the last census. The Tampa hearing, and one Monday evening in Clearwater, are among more than 20 being held across the state over a four-month period in preparation for the 2002 legislative session.

Keep communities intact, speakers pleaded. Don't draw lines purely for partisan political gain, they urged.

Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections Pam Iorio told lawmakers to "fix the mess" from the 1992 redistricting, when lines were so gerrymandered that even a mobile home park in the county was sliced into two state legislative districts. Iorio said gerrymandering dilutes voting strength and breeds cynicism among voters.

"It is so important to the voters that communities of interest be kept together, because that's how people mobilize," Iorio said. "That's how community activists get together and bring about change. . . . You create voter apathy when you divide communities of interest."

Rep. Johnnie Byrd, R-Plant City, who chaired Monday's sessions, promised a "fair, open and inclusive" reapportionment. But in reapportionment, the most partisan and often cutthroat of all legislative endeavors, there are always winners and losers.

Several speakers said too many hearings are during the day when working people can't attend.

Richard Braun of Spring Hill wondered why no hearings were scheduled in the seven-county 5th Congressional District, represented by Democrat Karen Thurman of Dunnellon.

"Please do not cut people out of this process," Braun pleaded.

Doretha Edgecomb of Tampa, a retired educator, said lawmakers must unite "communities of interest" and draw districts that keep Hillsborough residents together in as few districts as possible. That in itself would be a big change from the way things are now: Hillsborough is carved into 11 different state House districts, six of which are wholly within the county and five of which straddle neighboring counties.

Not everyone complained. Some retired federal employees said they like having Republican Mike Bilirakis or Thurman in Congress. Some Democrats pleaded with the Republican-dominated panel not to tinker with the seat now held by Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Davis, who is considered vulnerable to a Republican-sponsored remapping of districts.

U.S. Rep. Mark Foley, a West Palm Beach Republican, came to listen, and U.S. Rep. Adam Putnam, a Lakeland Republican, sent a lobbyist he has retained to look out for his interests.

David Shepp of the Lakeland-based Florida Strategic Group urged lawmakers to let Putnam keep representing Plant City strawberry farmers on Capitol Hill because Putnam is a "true advocate of the agriculture industry."

Former state Sen. Helen Gordon Davis of Tampa chided her fellow Democrats for "bleaching" districts in 1992. By creating new minority-access districts that increased black political representation in Tallahassee and Washington, Davis said, lawmakers "segregated" voters and "eroded" the responsibility of white politicians to be sensitive to minorities.

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