Posts Tagged ‘New York Times’
13
MAR
Gov. Cuomo’s Word (NY Times)
Gov. Andrew Cuomo vowed that he would veto politically warped and self-serving election maps. If he does not veto a shameful and cynical compromise being offered this week by legislative leaders in both parties, New Yorkers will be stuck with gerrymandered districts and Albany’s status quo for another decade.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/opinion/gov-cuomos-word-on-state.html
This was the year New York State lawmakers were going to stop protecting incumbents by gerrymandering political maps to improve their re-election chances.
Some 138 legislators signed a pledge saying they would turn over the redistricting process, which is required once a decade, to an independent panel. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo promised to transform the way the capital operated. And across the country, led by California, states took advantage of advances in computer technology and citizen engagement to improve their political mapmaking in the wake of the 2010 census.
With just 16 weeks until its Congressional primary, New York still has not approved political districts. New York is now among the last states in the nation to tackle the redistricting required as a result of the 2010 census. And the urgency is growing: the state’s Congressional primary is scheduled for June 26, and its legislative primary for Sept. 11.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/07/nyregion/unmapped-update-on-new-york-redistricting.html
5
MAR
Veto the Maps (NY Times)
New York’s Legislature is reportedly planning to offer Gov. Andrew Cuomo a bipartisan and utterly sleazy redistricting deal. If he will approve their new gerrymandered districts for the next decade, Assembly and State Senate leaders will propose a constitutional amendment they promise will improve the way the state draws election districts — in 2022. Mr. Cuomo must keep his promise and veto the Legislature’s self-serving maps.
Why should anyone believe this gang? During the 2010 campaign a majority of these same lawmakers signed a pledge to create an independent redistricting process to draw fair districts in time for this year’s vote. Of course, once they settled back into their cushioned seats, they decided it was better to wait another 10 years.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/05/opinion/veto-the-redistricting-maps.html
Legislative leaders, unable to agree on how to reduce New York’s Congressional delegation by two seats, submitted competing plans late Wednesday night for a federal judge to consider as she develops a redistricting plan that could be imposed by the court.
New York must reduce the size of its congressional delegation to 27 from 29 seats because of population shifts identified in the 2010 census, and the issue has taken on increasing urgency because a federal judge in an unrelated case has ordered the state to hold its congressional primary, normally scheduled in September, on June 26.
Read More: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/01/congressional-redistricting-plans-go-to-a-judge/
Each state must redraw its political maps to reflect the 2010 census, but New York, which has approved neither legislative nor Congressional districts for this year’s elections, is among the last to comply. Redistricting has become increasingly urgent because of the calendar; the state’s Congressional primary is scheduled for June 26, and its legislative primary on Sept. 11.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/01/nyregion/unmapped-update-on-new-york-redistricting.html
Each state must redraw its political maps to reflect the 2010 census, and New York is among the last to comply. The delay makes it harder for challengers to start campaigns. The state’s Congressional primary will be on June 26; its legislative primary will be on Sept. 11.
SO FAR
Legislative districts have been proposed by lawmakers, but not approved, and have been criticized as gerrymandered to protect incumbents. No Congressional districts have been proposed.
THE LATEST
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/nyregion/unmapped-update-on-new-york-redistricting.html
A panel of federal judges on Tuesday refused to dismiss a challenge to New York State’s redistricting process and instead named a federal magistrate judge to help create new political maps.
The panel ordered lawyers for legislative leaders and others involved in the case to convene at the Brooklyn federal courthouse on Monday. The judges said lawyers should be prepared to provide suggestions to the magistrate judge, Roanne L. Mann, “to assist her in preparing a redistricting plan, deadlines and the appointment of experts.”
It is crunch time for New York lawmakers, who are required to draw new maps for Congressional and legislative districts in time for the 2012 elections. The Congressional primaries are supposed to take place June 26, and as usual, the mapmakers are extremely late. It’s possible that they will release the Congressional maps, which have been drawn up in secret, this week since the Legislature is hoping to approve the new district lines by March 1.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/opinion/sunday/down-to-the-wire-on-redistricting.html
federal judge, citing lawmakers’ “current state of inaction” in redrawing New York’s political map, recommended on Monday that the state’s redistricting process be turned over to a court-appointed special master.
Noting that Congressional primaries are scheduled for June, the judge, Dora L. Irizarry of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, said it was time for the federal courts to take charge of ensuring that New York has an election process that complies with state and federal law.
A young woman at a hearing Thursday morning in Manhattan held up a large sign that read: “We Want Real Democracy.” That is precisely what the State Legislature’s official mapmakers — the Legislative Task Force on Demographic Research and Reapportionment, or Latfor — are determined to deny New Yorkers.
The proposed new maps, with their ridiculously warped and irregular border lines, are instead designed to keep Democrats in power in the Assembly and Republicans in charge in the State Senate for the next decade. Even worse, they also deprive minority communities of their fair share of clout.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/04/opinion/albanys-cynical-mapmakers.html
A proposed redrawing of New York State’s political districts came under intense criticism on Monday, as civil rights leaders said the maps did not fairly represent blacks and Hispanics in an increasingly diverse state, and Democrats said they would file a lawsuit asking a judge to intervene.
The proposed State Senate and State Assembly maps, released on Thursday, are being disputed by good-government groups, newspaper editorial boards and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who called into an Albany television program on Monday to declare the proposal “hyperpartisan,” and vowed to veto it.
This week, New York State lawmakers unveiled proposed legislative district maps, based on the 2010 census and required in time for this year’s elections. The maps, as expected, are entirely designed to protect party interests for Republicans who control the State Senate districts and Democrats who run the Assembly.
These maps are so self-serving and politically skewed that Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office has said they are “simply unacceptable.” He has repeatedly vowed to veto maps that were not drawn by an independent commission — and he should keep that promise.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/28/opinion/a-veto-for-the-voters.html
On Thursday, New York State lawmakers released their redistricting proposals for 2012. Those oddly jagged shapes may suggest gerrymandering, but do they have a deeper psychological meaning?
In September, City Room reported that the Ninth Congressional District, famous for being the former home of Anthony D. Weiner, happened to look like a dog on a boat. City Room’s take on the new State Senate redistricting proposals for the city appear above.
Read More: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/27/its-the-37th-district-or-is-it-a-squirrel/
Howard Leib, a 53-year-old entertainment lawyer, is considering a run for the New York State Senate this year.
But Mr. Leib, a Democrat from the Finger Lakes region, has an unexpected first challenge: he does not know what district he lives in.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/nyregion/new-yorks-redistricting-process-led-by-insiders.html
A Federal District Court late last month wisely upheld a 2010 Maryland law that counts prison inmates as residents in their home communities for purposes of redistricting, rather than at the prisons where they are incarcerated.
The practice of counting inmates as local “residents” — even though they lack the right to vote — has been used to inflate the power of mainly rural areas where prisons tend to placed. It undercuts the power of the urban districts where the inmates actually live and where they generally return when they are released.
Read More: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/17/opinion/counting-voters-fairly.html
