Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 1, 1990 TAG: 9007010245
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ROB EURE POLITICAL WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
IBM.
Legislators who 10 years ago hunkered on their knees drawing maps with colored pencils can shape the voting districts for the 1990s with a table-top computer and sophisticated programs capable of punching out population numbers block by block.
"We will have the capacity for instant analysis and adjustment," Senate Privileges and Elections Committee Chairman Joe Gartlan said.
Gartlan's committee and its counterpart in the House of Delegates will have control over drawing the congressional and legislative districts based on the population figures compiled in the 1990 census.
The new technology, although a speedy tool for the mapmakers, could just as easily prove to be a valuable weapon for critics of the eventual plan.
Republicans, and groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union and the NAACP - both of which successfully challenged the 1981 redistricting - plan to have their own computer programs to scrutinize the legislative plan and offer alternatives. Even state Democratic Party Chairman Paul Goldman, who is handy with figures, has announced that he will buy a package for the party to use in assessing the reapportionment.
The result could produce a chaotic number of competing plans and increase the likelihood of a court battle over the new lines.
Computer technology "means there are going to be many more plans that are really going to be right on the numbers," said Del. Clinton Miller, R-Shenandoah, a member of the House Redistricting Committee. "Instead of four or five main plans, we'll have maybe 20 or 25."
Population in the new districts will have to follow the one-man, one-vote rule of the U.S. Supreme Court, but it is also a partisan exercise slanted toward the Democrats by virtue of their majority.
Virginia Republicans are already raising money for computer software and lawyers' fees for what some in the party openly acknowledge is a likely legal challenge.
"I can't imagine a group of influential Democrats getting together to draw a plan that is slanted to protect Republicans," Miller said. "I don't criticize the politics: That's the way it's done. But like in any court case, we need to begin to build the record now."
The new high-tech angle just adds to what already promises to be a fractious redistricting. Undercurrents influencing the effort include the gradual shift of political power from rural to urban Virginia, a possible 11th congressional district and where it goes, and the nuances of the federal Voting Rights Act, which gives the U.S. Justice Department the job of examining the state redistricting to ensure that black votes are not diluted under the new districts.
At stake for Republicans is the potential for nearly permanent minority status as they face the first redistricting since 1960. Once again, they are outnumbered in the legislature and have no Republican governor to review the new political map.
"I think the lone Republican legislator surrounded by Democrats is the most vulnerable," Miller said. "And so are the occasional cluster of two or three" because Democrats could draw districts that force Republicans into the same district, such as Del. Steve Agee of Salem and Del. Malford "Bo" Trumbo of Botetourt County.
Democrats scoff at the early warnings from their GOP colleagues.
"They're crying foul and we haven't even had the chance to gouge their eyes," said Del. Clifton Woodrum, D-Roanoke.
While rural legislators scrap over the more and more sparsely populated districts in Western and Southside Virginia, Democrats from the urban north and east will fight over the location of the 11th congressional seat Virginia is expected to gain after the census is complete.
House Speaker A.L. Philpott, a veteran of three redistricting fights, said Western Virginia and Southside will lose five or six seats in the 100-member House of Delegates and two to three seats in the 40-member Senate.
House districts have to expand by 8,000 to 9,000 people, "and you just can't find that many people easily in rural areas," Philpott said. "That's where the trauma is going to be in our job."
Legislative districts will most often have to expand in areas to the north and east to accommodate the newly created districts in the fastest-growing areas of Northern Virginia and Tidewater. "The compromise line is going to be on the western edge of the urban crescent," said Del. Richard Cranwell, D-Vinton.
"If we get a new congressional district, that means that where we had 10 members of the House of Delegates, we'll have to go back to nine seats," Cranwell said.
But Philpott said the overriding factor in the legislative redistricting is practical - legislators fighting to keep their seats. "Everybody will be voting for themselves," he said. "Nobody I know is willing to sacrifice his seat for a particular plan."
Sen. Dudley "Buzz" Emick, D-Fincastle, said the worry over the shift of power is overblown.
"I just don't think that's valid. Where a delegate or senator retires is where you see the redistricting take place," Emick said. "If everyone runs for re-election, then you would see a gradual shift eastward."
More anguishing maneuvering is likely to surround the creation of an 11th congressional district. Virginia's population is expected to jump from the 5.35 million in the 1980 census to 6.2 million, according to estimates from the Virginia Employment Commission.
That growth rate of nearly 16 percent should outdistance the national growth rate enough to justify an additional seat for the state, although the complex formula Congress uses to decide on congressional seats does not guarantee Virginia a seat.
Assuming a new seat is created, its location is likely to provoke a fight among legislators in the urban corridor from Northern Virginia to Tidewater.
If population projections for Northern Virginia are correct, the region's delegation will grow from 20 to 25 delegates and from eight to 10 senators - a full quarter of the legislature.
"I do know that the new district will have to go where the people are, and the density of population is pretty clearly in this area," Gartlan said of Northern Virginia.
He estimates there are enough residents for 2 1/2 congressional districts within the current 8th and 10th districts, comprising Loudoun, Arlington and Fairfax counties, portions of Prince William and Stafford counties and the cities of Alexandria, Fairfax and Falls Church.
At the same time, Virginia's civil rights leaders, some Republicans and some black Democrats are eager for a majority black district. Such a district is probably only possible in Tidewater, though several observers say drawing such a district may be impossible even there.
"I'm sure they will demand a black district if it's physically possible, but I don't know how we can do it," Philpott said. "You don't have the concentration in any area to draw one, even if you override all the other guidelines for a district," such as a community of interest.
When Virginia Business magazine asked a marketing research firm in 1988 to find a black majority district, the result was a 45 percent black district created from a revamped 4th Congressional District. The proposed new district, which stretches from Petersburg to Hampton Roads, would drop Chesapeake and add Norfolk and Charles City County.
Such a change would leave the 2nd District, where the two parties are competitive, as an overwhelmingly white and Republican-leaning district comprised of Chesapeake and Virginia Beach.
"The Republicans want as many black districts as possible because that will mean more Republican, suburban districts created as a byproduct," said Larry Sabato, a political analyst at the University of Virginia.
The push for black-oriented districts may carry legal clout as well because of changes made during the past decade in the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Virginia falls under that act and can expect close review for minority representation from the Justice Department.
Before the act was amended in 1982, a minority representation challenge had to prove that redistricting intended to discriminate. Now a challenge need only show that the new lines effectively dilute black voting power.
Gov. Douglas Wilder, who owes his election last year to the margin he received in Northern Virginia and heavy black turnout, might come under pressure from both sides on the congressional redistricting. He already has said he wants to see a new district in Northern Virginia and does not favor a gerrymandered district for black representation.
"I don't think those artificial goals will be even looked at by anybody," Wilder said in February.
Gartlan said he sees no reason why placing the new district in Northern Virginia and drawing a district with heavy black concentration are "mutually exclusive."
If there is an 11th seat, neither of the Western Virginia districts would change dramatically, because they are the farthest from where major changes would take place.
But even a modest increase in the size of the 6th and 9th districts would pressure the 5th Congressional District in Southside, which would be squeezed from the west and east.
Adding to the complex issues at stake will be a severe time constraint for the General Assembly to complete its work.
Virginia and New Jersey are the only states with legislative elections scheduled for November 1991. In Virginia, party nominations are tentatively set for September.
Because the first hard census numbers are not expected until April, the legislature will need to act quickly to work out a plan in at least one special session, gain approval from Wilder and send the result to Washington for a 60-day review from Justice.
"If everything went perfectly, we would have a difficult time getting the nominating process in gear in time," Philpott said.
Moreover, a suit is pending in New York that could exacerbate the time crunch. That state has filed a federal suit seeking an automatic adjustment in the census figures for the phenomenon of "undercounting." The assumption of New York and other large urban states is that huge numbers of their inner-city residents are simply not counted in the census and that their state population figures should be automatically increased in compensation.
Should the federal court in New York agree with the state's argument, "we won't get any numbers until July," Steve Haner, Republican Caucus executive director, said.
Ten years ago, a successful challenge of the General Assembly's redistricting plan forced the process into 1982. Legislators had to run for three straight years in changing districts before the issue was settled.
Emick, the Fincastle Democrat, said the tight timetable "serves the incumbents. It keeps the Republican non-incumbents guessing about when they can announce and perhaps even who they would have to challenge to win a seat."
The Virginia constitution requires that the redistricting be completed in the first year of the decade. Woodrum failed in two attempts during the past decade to win legislative approval of a proposed amendment to the constitution giving the state an extra year to redistrict.
"Obviously, based on the 1981 experience and the inevitable bureaucratic foul-ups, we should give ourselves another year," he said.
"The whole process is designed for intrigue, reporters and lawsuits," said Del. Ford Quillen, D-Gate City, who chairs the House Privileges and Elections Committee. "For us, it will be like walking down a tightrope."
***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on July 3, 1990\ Correction:
Because of a copy editor's error, a story in Sunday's editions said Republicans face their first redistricting since 1960. It should have said the first redistricting since 1960 without a Republican governor.
Memo: correction