Update: The American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia has added a wrinkle into the redistricting debate, circulating a map that would create two majority-minority districts — a notion that experts said would be well-nigh impossible.
“What we’re doing here is laying out a proposal that we never thought was more refined or a final answer,” said Executive Director Kent Willis. “What we wanted to do was to have legislators look seriously at having two African-American majority districts.”
The 3rd district, represented by Rep. Bobby Scott, and the 4th district represented by Rep. Randy Forbes, would have black populations of about 52 percent each under the proposal.
After having so much fun re-drawing the state’s legislative district lines, Virginia lawmakers are back for more on Thursday.
Delegates and senators will reconvene to start negotiating the re-drawing of the state’s 11 congressional districts based on 2010 U.S. Census data — though a quick finish is unlikely.
The Republican-led House is pushing a plan that would largely protect the state’s 11 incumbent congressmen, while the Democratic-led Senate has offered a plan that would create a second minority influence district. U.S. Rep. Bobby Scott’s 3rd District is currently the state’s lone black-majority district.
Lawmakers, though, don’t expect a quick resolution. Del. Bill Janis, R-Henrico, the architect of the House bill, said he hopes to reach a deal by mid-July. Each side is expected to reject the other chamber’s plan and assign negotiators to hash out a compromise.
The Senate plan would reduce the black voting-age population in Scott’s district from 53 percent to about 42 percent, and would make Republican Rep. Randy Forbes’ southeastern district the state’s lone black-majority district.
“You’re really not doing anything other than changing where the majority-minority district [is] in Congress,” said Janis. “It represents what I believe is classic definition of retrogression.”
The state is now required to maintain at least one black-majority district, and tinkering with the lines too much could invite scrutiny from the Justice Department. Section 2 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which covers Virginia and a handful of other states with histories of racial discrimination at the polls, forbids diluting the voting strength of minority populations.
Janis’s plan would increase the black voting-age population in Scott’s district to 56 percent. Sen. Donald McEachin, D-Richmond, says the Senate plan is designed to stop “historical packing” of African-Americans in a given area into one district.
And Democrats have argued that in a state with a 20 percent African-American population, blacks should have another representative in Congress — and that the Senate plan would pass muster with the Justice Department.
