TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Florida's high stakes, once-a-decade process of redrawing its political boundaries has passed another big milestone at the state Capitol.
The House Redistricting Committee Friday passed its versions of House, Senate and congressional maps. Now they head to the House floor for debate.
Democrats voted against the maps, saying they preserve the Republicans' 2-to-1 majority in the Legislature when, in fact, there are slightly more registered Democrats in Florida.
But Republicans say they're proud of the maps and contend they follow new constitutional requirements not to favor incumbents or political parties, to be compact and preserve minority voting strength.
Committee Chairman Rep. Will Weatherford insists the maps are not political.
"I've never looked at political data on what the map does. I still couldn't tell you what the political implications are. All I care about are the legal implications. Did we follow what the constitution said we had to do. And I think the answer to that is emphatically yes."
The committee considered a new map submitted this week from the League of Women Voters, which criticized the House maps as an intentional effort to reconfigure districts to strengthen weaker incumbents.
But the League declined to explain the map before the committee and the measure was voted down.
Weatherford called the accusation disappointing.
"We've worked so hard to include the public in this process and we've always been accused that we might come up with some last-minute amendment to change the maps and we didn't do that. We drew a very fair map and for any organization to come in late, to write us a letter, tell us our map is wrong and is unconstitutional and then draft their own map and not have the guts to stand before this committee and explain what their maps does [sic], I just thought that was in poor form. Nothing could be further from the truth. There's not an ounce of political intent in these maps."
Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-Tampa, voted against the proposed maps.
"I'm not happy with the product. But the process, there was an attempt to be transparent, to be inclusive. To hear the people, but as much as we would have liked politics to play out of it, I think politics played in it."
State lawmakers held 26 public hearings around the state last summer to solicit input from people on redistricting. Weatherford said many of those suggestions are in the final maps.
The Senate has already passed its maps for Senate and congressional seats. Leaders in the House and Senate have agreed to accept each other's maps for their own chambers.
First Coast News