February 15, 2017

Fighting to Save Our Democracy

Dear Friends,

Most Virginians believe that gerrymandering is undermining our democracy.  It eliminates competition in elections, increases voter apathy, leads to  polarization, protects incumbents, discourages compromises, and ends in gridlock. People are demanding change.

For several years I have been fighting for redistricting  reforms. I have proposed both changes to the code and constitutional amendments.  Each suggestion passes the Senate only to be defeated in a House subcommittee on a subterfuge unrecorded vote -- with the Democrats voting "yes" and the majority Republicans voting "no."

This year I teamed up with Senator Jill Vogel, the Republican chair of the Privileges and Elections Committee.  I was chair during the last redistricting and so I know "up close and personal" how flawed the current system is.  Senator Vogel and I have worked together with the invaluable assistance of OneVirginia 2021 for over a year on this initiative. Our constitutional amendment passed the Senate 31 to 9.

Yesterday we went before the House subcommittee.  Once again, despite overwhelming public and business support, the Republicans all voted against our bill.  The audience spontaneously burst out with, "Shame!"  I totally agree.

Sen. Vogel and I received widespread newspaper coverage on this meeting and vote.  The Richmond Times published a front page article today.  Here it is -- please read it!

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Virginia redistricting reform efforts dead for the year as House kills bipartisan Senate proposals

Sens. Jill Holtzman Vogel, R-Fauquier (left), and Janet D. Howell, D-Fairfax, watched Tuesday as their redistricting bill fails to advance in a House of Delegates subcommittee.

By GRAHAM MOOMAW Richmond Times-Dispatch

A Virginia House of Delegates subcommittee on Tuesday dealt the finishing blow to redistricting reform efforts for the 2017 legislative session after sparring between the two lawmakers who spearheaded the last redrawing of legislative lines in 2011.

Three anti-gerrymandering measures that passed the Senate with bipartisan support - two of them sponsored by Republicans - died in 5-2 party-line votes in a GOP-controlled subcommittee dealing with elections.

The bills were aimed at creating what supporters said would be a fairer, more competitive electoral process with a map that doesn't favor a particular party or protect incumbents.

The House already had killed redistricting proposals from its own members, which left the Senate measures as the only vehicles for reform this year with a new round of redistricting - the redrawing of Virginia's legislative and congressional boundaries - coming after the 2020 U.S. census.

Though House Republicans killed redistricting bills silently earlier in the session, they offered a more forceful response at Tuesday's 7 a.m. committee meeting, which was packed with redistricting reform advocates.

When Sens. Jill Holtzman Vogel, R-Fauquier, and Janet D. Howell, D-Fairfax, stood to explain their proposal to set new redistricting criteria in the state constitution, a prominent Republican delegate asked Howell why she didn't use the same apolitical criteria in 2011 when she led redistricting of the Senate, which at the time had a Democratic majority.

"You had control over that when you were there," said Del. S. Chris Jones, R-Suffolk. "You could have done exactly what you wanted."

Howell said: "There is no way in a political system that we could possibly have allowed the House to do a totally political redistricting and leave the Senate unilaterally disarmed. We're not going to do that. That's the argument for why we need it in the constitution."

Republicans now hold majorities in the House and the Senate despite holding no executive offices. The GOP has not won a statewide election since 2009.
Jones asked Howell how Senate Democrats would have been unilaterally disarmed by "a fair process."

"It was spoken that the House was going to do a totally political redistricting," Howell said. "And you did."

"That's not true," Jones replied. "We had bipartisan support."

Several reform advocates and civic groups spoke in favor of the proposals, portraying them as good-government fixes that would refresh the democratic process at a time of rising citizen activism and flagging faith in politics.

"The people are watching now. They're watching more closely than they have in the past," said Sen. Emmett W. Hanger Jr., R-Augusta, whose proposal for an appointed redistricting commission also was rejected by the subcommittee.

Though the previous failed effort to get redistricting reform on the House election committee's agenda this month ended with yelling from the audience, the reaction Tuesday was more muted. The crowd voiced audible disappointment as each proposal failed, but the boos were more subdued than shouted.

Del. Mark D. Sickles, D-Fairfax, requested separate votes on the proposals immediately after the meeting began, potentially warding off a repeat of an earlier House action to kill all its redistricting proposals in one vote.

"A lot of people think is the most important thing happening in government and the biggest problem we have in the United States and Virginia," Sickles said.

Del. Mark L. Cole, R-Spotsylvania, disagreed with the notion that gerrymandering breeds political polarization. He attributed the divide to the stark political differences between urban and rural areas.

"I challenge you to draw a competitive district in Arlington. You can't do it," Cole said. "In most of rural Virginia, you can't draw a competitive district."

To change the state constitution before the 2021 redistricting, reforms would need to gain initial approval by 2019 because constitutional amendments require passage in two successive General Assembly sessions before going to voters on the ballot.

Advocates say reform could be achieved without a constitutional amendment, which could allow them to pursue legislation in 2020.
 

                       Best,
Janet Signature
  Senator Janet Howell


   

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