Editorial: Just drop redistricting plan
A file photo of the Nassau Legislature listening to protesters fill the Nassau Legislature chamber to voice their opinions about proposed redistricting. (May 9, 2011) Credit: Howard Schnapp
Nassau's Republican legislators saw why the county's redistricting can't reasonably be rushed this week. They should now let the process die before it squanders more time and money.
At Monday's meeting of the legislature, the Republicans introduced amendments changing the way Great Neck, Floral Park and Old Westbury are treated in the plan laid out just weeks ago. Then, an attorney and civil rights activist offered the body a third, entirely different set of lines that, unlike the option on the table, keeps legislators in their current districts.
The redistricting process should include multiple options, as well as the time needed for everyone to understand and debate them. With key election dates just weeks away, that can't happen now.
The Republicans tabled their plan without a vote Monday -- a wise move considering that this whole process was frozen in court last week. That injunction was removed by an appellate court Tuesday, but the legal wrangling will go on if the Republicans persist.
The attempt to hurriedly redistrict the county weeks after the release of the 2010 Census data, two years earlier than the county charter stipulates, with a minimum of public input and without the bipartisan commission the law demands, was a mistake -- but it is not yet a disaster. The Republicans, saddled with a court challenge on multiple grounds, an angry public and a bad process, should cut their losses before it becomes one. hN
