LITTLE ROCK — In six minutes and with no discussion, the board responsible for drawing Arkansas’ legislative districts approved the governor’s plan Friday for House and Senate districts on two 2-1 votes.
The districts’ boundaries were filed with the secretary of state later Friday. They go into effect in 30 days.
Gov. Mike Beebe, Attorney Genera lDustin McDaniel and Secretary of State Mark Martin make up the Board of Apportionment, which draws boundaries for 100 House districts and 35 Senate districts after each decennial U.S. Census.
The two Democrats, Beebe and McDaniel, voted for the governor’s maps. Martin,a Republican, voted against. Nearly every time the board has voted it split along party lines. All three had proposed a variety of options and refined their proposals over the weeks of deliberating and public hearings.
Martin said Beebe and McDaniel made the process more partisan than it needed to be because they didn’t provide final versions or data to his office until days before the vote.
“I don’t know who else to blame. I really think the participants in it made it partisan, and I hope that I didn’t contribute to that. I don’t feel like I did,” Martin said.
The governor denied that the plan or the process was political.
Beebe said the plan angered people from all sides of the political spectrum.
“He doesn’t know what went on,” said Beebe, who has watched the redistricting process for about three decades - as a state senator two decades, attorney general for four years and governor for four. “It’s a process that, every 10 years you’ve got folks that are happy and folks that are unhappy, depending on how their particular situation ends up. Usually it’s the people either that are in office or running for office that are either the happiest or the unhappiest.”
Board Executive Director Joe Woodson, Jr. said if the state is sued over whether the plan violates a state law, the lawsuit must be filed within the 30 days before the plan goes into effect. A suit claiming that the plan violates a federal law, such as the 1965 federal Voting Rights Act, can be filed at any time, he said.
Every redistricting since 1940 has been challenged in court. Many such challenges have been over the number of majority black districts.
In deciding the legality of district maps, courts often refer to “traditional redistricting principles.” Those include that districts need to have less than 10 percent population variance; not be drawn solely based on race; be designed with all parts connected and compact; avoid splitting political entities like cities; keep similar communities together; maintain the core of existing districts; protect incumbents; and minimize gerrymandering, which is drawing districts to protect a political party.
Both Beebe and Martin said their plan complies with the principles best.
The plan approved Friday stays within the population variance, protects all incumbent senators and most incumbent House members (Democratic and Republican) and each district is contiguous, or in one piece.
APPROACHES
From the start, the approaches taken by Martin, on one hand, and Beebe and Mc-Daniel, on the other, differed. At the board’s first meeting, Beebe surprised Martin by bringing up an expenditure of board funds Martin had made without board approval.
Also, Martin began producing maps before the board’s public hearings began. He said the public should have an actual map to comment on. He produced five Senate maps and three House maps before the first meeting.
“Outvoted two to one, I think that the best perspective for me to actually take was to serve the voters of Arkansas and listen to the comments and the feedback,” Martin said after the vote. “There was no way that I could actually get any kind of political map that benefited me from a political standpoint, so my idea of doing it was just doing the best job I could to serve those people that were making comments to us.”
The governor and attorney general waited until after all but one of the hearings to base their maps on what was requested by members of the public in the earlier meetings. The first versions they released had very similar boundaries.
Martin said he didn’t feel like his plans were taken seriously by Beebe and McDaniel.
“All of the stuff that we are actually putting forward was not implemented,” Martin said. “The governor’s and attorney general’s maps ... virtually they had agreed what was in it. We really had very little input.”
Beebe said that Martin set the tone by putting a map out first.
“If you want to talk about who started putting stuff out without consultation, he’s the guy who put it out without consultation and before the hearings. Just look in the mirror, that’s all he needs to do if he wants to talk about putting maps out and starting stuff without consultation,” Beebe said.
McDaniel said the map put out by the secretary of state in May was a surprise.
“All of our staffs had worked together for months ... it became clear that the secretary of state’s vision was different,” McDaniel said.
Beebe said he did not work with McDaniel on his map, saying it would have been a violation of the state’s Freedom of Information Act for two board members to meet without public notice. He said the staff from all three offices worked together.
“Their staff worked with our staff, didn’t have any trouble working, and I think if you talk to the [attorney general’s] staff they’ll tell you that they had no problem working with our staff, but of course I didn’t work with Martin and I didn’t work with McDaniel privately because it would have been a violation of the Freedom of Information Act. [Martin] ought to know that by now, since he’s gotten into so much trouble with the Freedom of Information Act,” Beebe said.
Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample clarified that the governor was referring to interaction between media and the secretary of state’s office about the act in recent months.
A spokesman for Martin disputed what Beebe and Mc-Daniel said.
“They never gave us a direction they wanted to go, and they never reacted positively or negatively to the maps [put out by the secretary of state,]” spokesman Mark Myers said. “Obviously they had been corresponding with each other and leaving us out of the discussion.”
The secretary of state had less variance in population in districts in his final proposals than the maps that Beebe and McDaniel approved Friday. The highest variance from the ideal Senate district population in the secretary of state’s map was 517 people, or 0.62 percent.
The largest variance in Martin’s proposal from the ideal House district population was 885 people, or 3.04 percent.
The plans also differed on the number of districts with a majority black population. Martin’s plan increased the number of House districts from 13 to 15, Beebe’s lowered it to 11.
Beebe said that drop in House districts was necessary because of how the black population has moved and to preserve a black majority in House districts high enough to elect black lawmakers.
Although the black population in Arkansas grew 7 percent from 2001-2010, the black proportion of Arkansas’ total population fell from 15.7 percent to 15.4 percent.
Beebe said some black lawmakers say that they need more than 52 percent of a district’s population to be black.
Martin said the board should have at least maintained 13 majority black districts.
“The African American community was very disenfranchised by the maps that were adopted today,” Martin said. He said in a statement that the number of districts should have matched the black portion of the population.
The 15 black districts proposed by the secretary of state would match the black percentage of the population.
The governor’s plan creates 11 black majority House districts, with an average black population of 57.3 percent.
Both plans have four majority black Senate districts. The secretary of state’s plan had an average black population of 57.17 percent in black-majority districts. The governor’s plan has an average population of 55 percent.
SENATE DISTRICTS
The Senate plan has a total range of variance of 8.2 percent. The U.S. Supreme Court has said districts can vary by up to 5 percent above or below 83,312 people. The two districts with the highest deviation from the ideal population are on the state’s eastern border.
The 24th, held by Sen. Jack Crumbly. D-Widener, is 3,835 people above ideal, or 4.6 percent. It includes all of Crittenden County, along with parts of Cross, Lee, Phillips and St. Francis counties.
The 22nd, held by Sen. David Burnett, D-Osceola, is 3,001 people below the ideal population, or 3.6 percent below. It used to be labeled District 15.
It covers all of Mississippi and Poinsett counties and part of Craighead County, not including Jonesboro.
Seven districts deviate from the ideal number by 2 percent or more. Nineteen deviate by 1 percent or less. The remaining nine vary by between 1 percent and 2 percent of ideal.
The final map pits no sitting senators against one another, but a handful of senators’ homes are no longer in the same district as their current constituents.
The home of Sen. Jason Rapert, R-Bigelow, is no longer in the district that he represents now. He would have to move in order to represent the same constituents.
His neighborhood now is in the 15th District, where Sen. Gilbert Baker, R-Conway, is term-limited. The district includes Conway and Perry counties along with portions of Faulkner, Pulaski and Van Buren counties.
The 24th held by Crumbly has a 52.88 percent black population and the 25th held by Sen. Stephanie Flowers, DPine Bluff has a 58.26 percent black population. It takes in portions of Arkansas, Desha, Jefferson, Lincoln, Monroe and Phillips counties.
The 30th held by Sen. Linda Chesterfield, D-Little Rock, has a 53.19 percent black population. It used to be labeled 34th. It is in the southeast corner of Pulaski County west to Little Rock and north to Jacksonville.
The 31st held by Sen. Joyce Elliot, D-Little Rock, has a 58.26 percent black population.
HOUSE DISTRICTS
The House map has a total range of variance of 8.36 percent. The ideal population is 29,159.
The district with the largest variance is 1,338 people below the ideal number, or 4.59 percent below. It is the 51st held by Rep. Keith Ingram, D-West Memphis, which encompasses West Memphis. It used to be labeled 53rd.
The second largest variance is 1,099 people above the ideal, or 3.77 percent above. The district comprises parts of four old districts, including those of three term-limited House members.
Twenty-four districts deviate from the ideal number by 2 percent or more. Fifty-two districts deviate by 1 percent or less. The remaining 24 districts vary by between 1 percent and 2 percent.
The final plan’s majority black districts are numbered the 5th, 12th, 16th, 17th, 29th, 30th, 34th, 36th, 37th, 48th and 50th.
The 5th in south central Arkansas stretches from Magnolia in Columbia County into parts of Lafayette, Nevada and Ouachita counties. It has a 52.54 percent black population. Reps. Garry Smith, DCamden, and David Fielding, D-Magnolia, both live in the district.
Much of the eastern border of the state is in the 12th, which has no incumbent, the 48th, held by Rep. Reginald Murdock, D-Marianna, and the 50th, held by Rep. Hudson Hallum, D-Marion.
In Jefferson County, in the 16th, live both Rep. Efrem Elliott, D-Altheimer and Rep. James Word, D-Pine Bluff. Also in Jefferson County is the 17th, held by Rep. Hank Wilkins, D-Pine Bluff.
Around Little Rock are the 29th, held by Rep. Fred Love, D-Little Rock; the 30th, held by Rep. David Sanders, R-Little Rock; the 34th, held by Rep. John Walker, D-Little Rock; the 36th, held by Rep. Darrin Williams, D-Little Rock; and the 37th held by Rep. Tracy Steele, D-North Little Rock.
Proposals from each board member and the final map are available at www.arkansasredistricting.org.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 07/30/2011