Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 3, 1991                   TAG: 9104030257
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Medium

NEW DISTRICT PLANS ADD 4 BLACK SEATS

Republicans and the ACLU unveiled separate but similar plans Tuesday that would add four new majority-black districts.

Kent Willis, state ACLU director, said his plan also would increase the black population in existing minority districts.

Nine of the 100 House districts now have black majorities, and Democrats have proposed creating two more.

"The Democrats did a poor job. . . . They created a large number of very weak black-majority districts," Willis said.

The Republican plan - presented by Del. Vance Wilkins, R-Amherst - is the second proposal by the GOP. The first added three black districts.

Willis and Wilkins said they had not consulted each other about their plans. "I would like to see theirs," Wilkins said.

Gov. Douglas Wilder, meanwhile, said a Senate redistricting plan that creates no new majority-black districts would be hard to defend.

The Democratic-backed redistricting plan preserves two black districts in Richmond and Hampton Roads. The ACLU has proposed a Senate plan that would increase the number of black districts from two to four.

Wilder said the Democrats' plan could run into trouble with the U.S. Justice Department, which must review Virginia voting law changes because of the state's history of racial discrimination.

The governor is working on his own redistricting plan that he said would be fair and not designed merely to protect incumbents.

"It is not my job to approve a plan to guarantee any incumbent seats," he said.

He also said he would look askance at any oddly drawn district, even if it created a seat controlled by black voters.

"You've got to look to see what's contiguous," Wilder said.

Sen. Frank Nolen, D-Augusta, filed his own redistricting proposal Tuesday that keeps Shenandoah Valley seats intact at the expense of Northern Virginia.

The Democratic Senate plan places Republican Sens. William Truban of Woodstock and Kevin Miller of Harrisonburg in the same district while increasing the number of Northern Virginia senators from nine to 10.

Nolen proposed instead that the valley keep its three senators and Northern Virginia be left without the open seat.

Keywords:
GENERAL ASSEMBLY POLITICS