Members of the Connecticut Reapportionment Committee responsible for creating the state’s new congressional district map are going back to the drawing table – at least until noon Wednesday.
Dr. Nathaniel Persily, a James B. McClatchy professor of Law at Stanford Law School who oversaw Monday’s virtual Supreme Court public hearing, urged committee leaders, Sen. Kevin Kelly, R-Stratford, and Rep. Matt Ritter, D-Hartford, to meet one more time in the next 48 hours to see if the two parties can come to an agreement.
The petition was filed to give the commissioner more time to agree to maps, citing a delay in receipt of the 2020 U.S. Census Report.
“I look forward to hearing from members of the commission in 48 hours,” Persily said. “Please submit with me a final plan you have arrived at, or a partial plan or some other filing prior to going forward. Between now and next Monday, or next Tuesday, I will be drawing a plan and am eager to see what the commission can come up with in the next 48 hours.”
While the committee has yet to come to an agreement over the maps, both Kelly and Ritter made their cases during the hour-long proceedings. The crux of the issue is Congressional District 1, referred to as the “lobster claw” for its unique shape.
The maps, by state law, must contain equal population, prohibit consideration of incumbents and election returns, and districts can’t be less compact than already drawn.
Kelly, in his near 10 minutes of testimony, said the map Republicans submitted complies with the court’s Dec. 23, 2021, order, which calls for making the least amount of change to existing Congressional districts to meet the requirements for population, equality, contiguity, adhering to the Voting Rights Act, federal laws, compactness and not splitting towns.
The target population for the five Congressional districts was 721,189 people, per the latest U.S. Census, according to Kelly.
“All the maps are within one person,” Kelly said. “Our proposed map does not violate town lines more than the existing Congressional districts. Our proposed map reduces the number of town [splits] from five to four.”
Kelly said the ultimate goal of redistricting is “to have the lease amount of change possible,” but preserving the status quo, which he said would include gerrymandered districts, “cannot be allowed to continue unchallenged.”
The veteran Republican legislator said the lobster claw district was first drawn in 2001, when the state’s Congressional delegation was reduced from six members to five. He said the map allowed a resident of Danbury, in the 5th District at the time, and a resident of New Britain, in the 6th District at the time, run for the newly created seat, which featured the new, oddly-shaped district.
“Just because a gerrymandered map was created in the past,” Kelly said, “does not make it right today.”
Kelly said he thinks the Republican drawn map was the “best map to comply both with the order of the court and the people of Connecticut.”
Ritter testified that he felt the Democrats’ map fit the court’s orders best.
“The cornerstone of this is to alter the existing district lines as little as is reasonably possible,” Ritter said. “I believe the map the Democrats submitted does just that. There are no new town cuts, it abides by the voting rights act, equalizes population in the districts, maintains contiguity of the districts, and does not reduce their compactness.”
Ritter said the Republican map was “thoughtful,” but “I believe our plan adheres more closer to the requirements of the court’s orders. Mainly, again, there are no new split towns and to the extent of Torrington. We moved 71,736 people to new districts with our proposal. The other plan, which unifies one town, Torrington, does it by moving approximately 125,000 people. The amount of disruption, I believe, is significant.”
After testimony was completed, Persily was able to get Kelly and Ritter to agree to go back to the table to see if the commission can finally agree to new maps.
Persily said he wanted the commission to “come up with a partial plan, if not a full plan.” He said that in the past he has drawn up maps that would potentially “displease” the commission as it has in other instances.
“If you are able to come up with a map, I would approve it, and urge the court to approve it,” Persily said before adjourning the hearing.
