Jason Poreda, staff director of the House Select Committee on Redistricting acknowledged that the line did not follow roadways or political boundaries but power lines but he said the change was made to make the district more compact. Every Senate Democrat and nine Republicans voted down the plan.
Advertisement
Oliva said he was confident that the numbers in all the draft maps proposed by the House and Senate are sufficient to elect thre Hispanics in Miami.
Earlier this year, the House and Senate failed to come to an agreement on new congressional maps.
“Having been living intimately in this world, I have concluded that the amendments to our Constitution pulled the soul out of map drawing, pulled the soul out of districts”, said Senate Reapportionment Chairman Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton.
Sen. Greg Evers, R-Baker, complained the map split his rural Okaloosa County community in half, leaving his strawberry patch in his district but the community’s school and water supply in another district.
“We think our map-drawers put together a great map, one that is constitutionally compliant”, Crisafulli said.
“What this map does is preserve the three Hispanic seats [in Miami-Dade County]”, Diaz de la Portilla told his fellow senators.
The Florida Legislature has yet again failed to reach an agreement on a key political map. The settlement was prompted by a lawsuit filed by the Florida League of Women Voters, Common Cause and other groups that had challenged the constitutionality of the original map.
“By blaming the amendments, rather than themselves, they are simply perpetuating their opposition to the will of the people and engaging in the very conduct that Florida voters clearly wanted to eliminate from our state”, said David King, the lawyer representing the coalition. Nancy Detert, R-Venice.
Diaz de la Portilla defended the amendment, saying it was best for the interests of the heavily Hispanic community in Miami-Dade County. Those districts had emerged as the main obstacle to a final deal.
The two redistricting chairmen, Galvano and state Rep. Jose Oliva, met in a rare two-person conference committee Thursday afternoon, in an attempt to end the staelmate. But a few Senate members still have concerns about whether it can pass. Supporters of the plan said a united front would give the Legislature a chance at winning court approval for the map.
This makes three out of four legislative sessions this year that ended in discord, this time in a redistricting session that itself likely will have cost taxpayers into the hundreds of thousands.
Galvano said he has asked the Senate’s general counsel to talk with Florida global University political science Professor Dario Moreno, who has been retained by the Legislature to analyze the voting impact of the maps on Hispanic voters, about whether the proposals are retrogressive.
The Senate will meet later Thursday to reconsider and possibly vote on the House-approved map. Speaking to reporters after the session, Oliva tried to point out at least one success for the House.
“I’m not as optimistic that those people will be significantly more impartial than these people”, he said.
Moments later, House Minority Leader Mark Pafford, D-West Palm Beach, called Thursday a “jump the shark moment” for the state’s Republican Party.
Advertisement
“What we saw today is an example of years of arrogance, selfishness – was an example of a party that got punched in the face by its own system”, Pafford said.
