\nOneida County, in upstate New York, would like to avoid prison-based gerrymandering when drawing their county Board of Legislators’ districts. Their Senator, however, was one of the nine that filed a law suit that is not only holding up their redistricting process, but threatens to force Oneida, as well as other counties across the state, to draw districts distorted by prison populations.\n<\/p>\n
\nRobert Brauchle’s State debate over prisoners muddies county\u2019s redistricting talks<\/a>, published in the Observer-Dispatch<\/i>, explains the problem:\n<\/p>\n \nIn Oneida County Legislator David Wood\u2019s district, about two-thirds of his constituents can go grocery shopping, drive a car and vote.\n<\/p>\n \nThe remaining third are locked in prison cells.\n<\/p>\n \nNow, as the county prepares for the upcoming redistricting process to determine the boundaries for the Board of Legislators\u2019 districts, officials are becoming increasingly unnerved about the partisan debate in Albany that will affect where those prisoners are counted.\n<\/p>\n \nA law signed by former-Gov. David Paterson in August counts prisoners in their pre-arrest locations during the redistricting process. Previously they had been counted in the location where they were incarcerated.\n<\/p>\n \nThat change would impact the county Reapportionment Committee\u2019s ongoing redistricting work to address population shifts within the county and to make the population even in each district.\n<\/p>\n \nBut state Sen. Joseph Griffo, R-Rome, along with eight other Senate Republicans, have filed a lawsuit against the Task Force on Demographic Research and Reapportionment and the state Department of Correctional Services to overturn the 2010 redistricting law.\n<\/p>\n \n\u201cIt\u2019s not like they come here, and everything is self contained,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s a draw on resources and a cost to them being here.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nUntil the process in the state Legislature plays out, the roughly 4,500 state prisoners in Oneida County will remain in limbo over whether they should officially be recorded as citizens in their location of incarceration or their pre-arrest homes.\n<\/p>\n \nWood, the county Board of Legislators majority leader, said he would like to see prisoners counted at their pre-arrest locations.\n<\/p>\n \n \u201cIf we have to count them out of the cells, then we\u2019ll do it that way,\u201d said Wood, R-Rome, who represents a district that includes Mohawk Correctional Facility and Oneida Correctional Facility. \u201cBut this is stalling us right now in some bureaucratic time warp that we can\u2019t get out of.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \nRamon Velasquez, of VOCAL, also responds to the law suit in an informative article<\/a> that gives a first-person account of experiences with prison-based gerrymandering in the state, as well as some background on the issue.\n<\/p>\n