How you might get a say on 2012 redistricting

SPRINGFIELD - A map of Illinois' legislative districts is currently a squiggly, squirrely scheme largely designed to protect incumbent lawmakers.

State Sen. Kwame Raoul said Thursday that he hopes to make the line-drawing process more transparent for the 2012 redistricting.

To do this, the Chicago Democrat and the other members of the Senate Redistricting Committee will take to the road this summer and fall to listen to Illinois voters and hear their suggestions for how to reform the redistricting process.

"We're not going to be in the business of saying there's a magic computer they use in Iowa and run hastily to say that's the magic answer to how to appropriately approach redistricting. We're going to be deliberative, we're going to be open and we're going to receive recommendations from all sources," Raoul said.

The Illinois Reform Commission recently criticized Illinois' redistricting process because it gives control over redistricting to whichever political party's name is drawn from a hat.

In 2001, Democrats were chosen and have controlled both houses of the General Assembly ever since.

The reform commission suggested Iowa-style computer-drawn districts as a model system for Illinois to follow. Newspapers throughout the state have echoed that call.

"I'm not just going to read an editorial page and say, 'Oh because this editorial page says do it like Iowa, I should do it like Iowa.' I don't approach anything, any legislative duty like that," Raoul said. "The legislature is a deliberative body and our approach to redistricting is going to be the same."

The committee will hold hearings July 15 in Chicago, Aug. 19 in Peoria, Sept. 16 in Carbondale and Oct. 14 in Springfield.

Exact locations have not yet been determined.

But Mattoon state Sen. Dale Righter, the top Republican on the redistricting committee, has another plan in mind. He's introduced a constitutional amendment to turn map drawing over to an independent contractor, subject to approval by the General Assembly.

"The proposal that I've put out there does not take into account incumbents' addresses, does not take into account political affiliation, requires bipartisan agreement on a map or lets the Supreme Court by supermajority adopt the map that the commission has recommended. That is a far, far better process than someone sticking their hand in a replica of Abraham Lincoln's stovepipe hat and drawing out one of the envelopes," Righter said.