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Mostly Cloudy Democrats win Nassau County redistricting decision
Court rules Republican plan no good for 2011
Nassau County Democrats hailed a unanimous decision by the Court of Appeals last week that said the new districts proposed by Republicans could not be used for the November elections.
The court, in its 7-0 decision, ruled on Aug. 30 that there was nothing wrong with how the new lines were drawn. However, it said that the new districts could not be implemented until the 2013 general election.
“The Court of Appeals spoke,” said Nassau County Democratic Chairman Jay Jacobs. “It’s the highest court in the state. But it didn’t speak in a partisan way.” Jacobs pointed out that the decision came from a board of judges comprised of four Republicans and three Democrats.
The county charter states that the county’s 19 districts are to be redrawn after every federal census, and that the lines are to be drawn by an 11-member bipartisan commission, which the County Republicans did not.
When the lines were first adopted by Republicans in May, the Democrats sued, and a court order stopped the implementation of the new districts. The Supreme Court ruled that the lines could not be used in the 2011 elections. The Republicans appealed the decision, and the Appellate Court overturned the original decision, reinstating the lines. Now, the Court of Appeals overturned the Appellate decision, reinstating the original Supreme Court ruling.
The Democrats, however, still hold that the lines themselves are improper, and have vowed to change them.
“I can guarantee these will not be the lines people will see in 2013,” Jacobs said. “The Democrats are going to call for a nonpartisan commission to do this correctly. We don’t believe that even if we get the power to draw the lines, we’re going to behave the way the Republicans did.”
Republican representatives were unavailable for comment.
Jacobs hailed the decision as not only being a victory for the Democrats, but a big defeat for the Republicans. “This has been a really bad August for the Republicans, starting out with the loss on the [Nassau Coliseum] referendum,” he said. “Then followed up at the end of the month, they have this stunning decision, which is a real smackdown from the Court of Appeals. If they thought August was bad, wait until they see what we do to them in November.”
