SJR 36 - REAPPORTIONMENT BOARD & REDISTRICTING Mr. RALPH BENNETT, staff to CHAIRMAN TAYLOR, presented the sponsor statement for SJR 36, saying the bill proposes an amendment to articles six and fourteen of the Alaska Constitution. According to MR. BENNETT, these changes will reflect rulings by the U.S. and Alaska Supreme Court and will enshrine single-member districts in the Alaska Constitution. MR. BENNETT said certain supreme court rulings established a "one person one vote" rule and, as a result, all legislative bodies in the U.S. are apportioned on the basis of population. He added that the Alaska Constitution, as originally written, bases Senate districts partly on population and partly on geography. MR. BENNETT said certain Alaska Court rulings have established an equal basis for both civilian and military population. MR. BENNETT explained that Section three of the bill removes the authority of the Governor to reapportion, and affords the Governor only the authority to redistrict. He pointed out two memos in the member's packets that address the difference between the two terms. MR. BENNETT stated that section four of the bill establishes single-member legislative districts for the House, essentially, constitutionalizing what is already happening. Single member districts seem to work well in Alaska, according to MR. BENNETT. MR. BENNETT informed the committee that section eight eliminates references to reapportionment and specifically allows for judicial review of a Governor's acts or failure to act. He said this section also gives priority to redistricting cases that are brought before the Superior or Supreme Courts. Section ten repeals sections five and seven in article six and article 14 of the Alaska Constitution. RALPH BENNETT explained that article 14 sets out the original reapportionment schedule, now obsolete. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR stated that this is basically the same as a piece of legislation moving through the House. SENATOR MILLER moved the adoption of the Workdraft "E" version as a committee substitute in lieu of the original bill. SENATOR ELLIS objected and asked about the difference between the two versions. MR. BENNETT explained that some changes were made as the bill passed through the process in the House. Section four specifically mentions the number of house and Senate seats. Section eight establishes the priority for a judicial review and redistricting is changed to reapportionment throughout the bill. MR. BENNETT said the terms are similar but defined very differently. SENATOR ELLIS asked MR. BENNETT to read the definitions for the record. RALPH BENNETT said Black's Law Dictionary defines apportionment as "the process by which legislative seats are distributed among units entitled to representation or for reapportionment, or a new apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives among states according to their respective numbers." He said districting is defined as "the establishment of precise geographic boundaries of such units or constituency. He again referred to the memos in the member's packets and suggested it might also be helpful in understanding the differences between these two words. SENATOR ELLIS asked, simply stated, what the change in the bill results in. MR. BENNETT replied that, under the new bill, more of an emphasis is placed on population and geography, not a formula. TAPE 98-17, SIDE B Number 001 MR. JEFF LOGAN, Staff to Representative Joe Green, said that the change from redistricting to reapportionment due to the suggestion of the bill drafter, who believes redistricting is more a term of art and more accurately reflects what the Governor is doing by changing lines within the state. Reapportionment takes place among the states and is more directed by population and geography. SENATOR ELLIS asked if the drafter's opinion was that the framers of the Alaska Constitution had used the wrong word. MR. LOGAN replied he was not sure, he only knew that it was their opinion the change describes the process more accurately. MR. JIM BALDWIN, representing the Attorney General's office, came forward and agreed that the change in wording was not intended to change the process, but only alters the label given to it. He said this is his understanding and nothing to the contrary has come to light in the testimony on the companion house bill thus far. He said there are many alarming things about this bill but, unless the change in wording does more than it seems to, these changes do not alarm him. MR. BALDWIN said his main concerns begin with the preclearance requirements of the Voting Rights Act. He said that when the state comes up with a plan, it must be submitted for preclearance. He thinks certain aspects of this resolution may also require preclearance and the fiscal note his department has not yet, but intends to provide, will reflect this. He said the bill also requires reapportionment be done in single member districts, as it was done in the 1990 reapportionment. MR. BALDWIN says this reapportionment was upheld by the courts, although some questions were raised about single-member districts in Southeast Alaska. MR. BALDWIN commented that multi-member districts have been used in prior plans and have been validated. He said the court decision cited in previous testimony do not mandate single-member districts, though they do express a preference for them. He said redistricting and reapportionment are difficult for the large geography and sparse population of our state. MR. BALDWIN said the flexibility that multi-member districts can give the Governor in the case of retrogression is useful. He fears we may face a retrogression situation in regards to minority voters in the next plan. He said retrogression in some districts might be avoided by the use of multi-member districts, in others he feels it may be unavoidable. MR. BALDWIN speculated that the ability to go to a multi-member district also might help meet preclearance requirements, but said he can't say for certain. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if the preclearance requirements based on the Voting Rights Act were partially thrown out by the federal court, specifically the portion relating to racial quotas. JIM BALDWIN responded that some plans, in some states, were invalidated. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if it was because of an attempt to quantify and include a certain percentage of racial groups within the areas. MR. BALDWIN explained that the reason they were thrown out was because the court believed there was too much emphasis on race, and not enough placed on typical redistricting standards. When race is figured in equally with other factors like compactness and contiguity, a plan will be upheld. When race is placed above all else, plans will fail, as has happened. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR commented that our last reapportionment considered race above other factors, saying linguistics was even considered in attempting to draw the lines. He believes Alaska is subject to the same type of litigation as the other states mentioned. He said this is why he was surprised to hear MR. BALDWIN referring to the retrogressive effect that single-member districts might have, since it is retrogressive only racially. MR. BALDWIN clarified that he was not saying single-member districts are themselves retrogressive, he meant that the state will have to deal with the fact that the native population in proportion may have reduced representation. One way to remedy this would be to set up "influence districts", which may help also with preclearance. SENATOR MILLER asked if the recent court rulings didn't tend more toward the "one person, one vote" idea. He also recalled that in the 80's when there was a combination of single and dual-member districts, the dual-member districts were all in the urban areas and the single-member districts were in the rural areas. SENATOR MILLER said he was having a hard time reconciling this with the argument that single-member districts work against rural Alaska. MR. BALDWIN replied it is simply a tool that might be used if they found themselves in a retrogression situation as he predicts. He thinks it is wise to refrain from cutting themselves off from this useful tool. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR said he thought that whoever had advocated that theory before the court was severely chastised by the courts. MR. BALDWIN interjected that these same people played a strong role here the last time and CHAIRMAN TAYLOR agreed and asked Mr. BALDWIN to define "retrogressive." MR. BALDWIN replied it is defined as the loss of representation for minority voters from one reapportionment to the next. SENATOR PARNELL asked if that was a function of how the boundaries were drawn. SENATOR MILLER added that Alaska is a growing state, though the minority population is staying the same. He said the result of this is a loss of representation, but this would be due more to "one person, one vote" than to how you draw the lines within the state, even when striving to give minority districts the most voting power possible. He restated that if there is a shrinkage in seats, it's probably due to the "one man, one vote" rule and he does not think this can be corrected. JAMES BALDWIN agreed, saying also once you get outside the urban areas, it is a difficult task. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR commented he believes that Southeast Alaska will lose a house seat due to industrial and population decline and the Mat-Su valley will gain one to go along with their population boom. He said this may have a retrogressive effect, but does not have anything to do with someone going out and causing something to happen, it is solely a factor of one person, one vote. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if the state would have to be sure that, if they drew single-member districts, one of them was Jerry Mackie's old "iceworm" district in order to satisfy preclearance requirements. MR. BALDWIN replied they have to be very careful, establish a good record and have a good justification for making drastic changes in plans. He noted we are still being monitored and SENATOR ELLIS explained it is due to past discrimination against natives. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR said he never understood that ruling and found it very insulting. MR. BALDWIN remarked that it is a burden and requires much time and effort to satisfy. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR agreed and expounded on that theme, asking if they will have to get preclearance on whether or not they can pass the Governor's sell- out of this state's sovereignty to the U.S. government. He allowed some people may characterize this differently than he does, but emphasized the heavy burden of preclearance. MR. BALDWIN said anything affecting voting must be precleared under the federal act. He mentioned he did not seem to be making inroads on single-member districts and would therefore move on. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR said everthing he sees in the House bill indicates they are not utilizing a panel constructed out of the courts. JEFF LOGAN indicated that this was a different bill CHAIRMAN TAYLOR was referring to, HJR 44 which restructures the reapportionmnet board. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if they couldn't be rolled together and MR. BALDWIN replied that the bill in front of them was looking better and better. JIM BALDWIN said section three, which says that redistricting shall be based on census, is changed by removing the word "civilian", resulting in the inclusion of military people who temporarily reside in the state. He said surveys were done to try and establish who was an actual resident, and adjustments made to remove the non- resident military personnel. MR. BALDWIN said he believs that this bill takes away the ability to remove and adjust for non-resident military personnel and this is problematic. He said although this was not done in the last reapportionment, the court ruled that if it is too difficult to be done, it need not be done, but the court still requires proof of an attempt to do it. MR. BALDWIN said with the recent base alignment and closures,the allocation of more military personnel (he estimates 9,000 plus dependents) could create an entire district. This would be an urban district, and MR. BALDWIN suggested it could have a voting rights affect, and become a preclearance issue. He addmitted it is a policy call for the Legislature to decide if they want to do this, but he thinks it is better to leave it as it stands now. SENATOR MILLER, who represents a base, asked MR. BALDWIN if he feels military people are less deserving of equal representation than others. He finds this offensive. SENATOR ELLIS clarified that military personnel who are residents get the same representation in state elections as non-military residents, MR. BALDWIN was only referring to the ability to exclude non-resident military persons. SENATOR MILLER replied that JIM BALDWIN had used the term non- voting, which is very different. He said there are many non-voting people in rural Alaska as well. MR. BALDWIN clarified that was, in fact, what he meant. SENATOR ELLIS said he thinks it is important that the people in rural Alaska are held to the same criteria. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked what would happen if the state held an election without being granted preclearance. MR. BALDWIN replied that someone would make a motion to enjoin the state. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if that meant we could not hold the election ansd MR. BALDWIN responded that the law mandates we receive preclearance for any changes requiring preclearance before an election is held. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR said it would be an interesting thing to watch. SENATOR PEARCE commented that she did not think the staate had preclearance for the last time and CHAIRMAN TAYLOR explained that the entire ballot must be stated before preclearance, and this requires knowing everything that will appear on the ballot. MR. BALDWIN noted that precinct changes must be precleared also. SENATOR PEARCE mentioned that when the courts threw out our reapportionmnet plan the election was not nullified and MR. BALDWIn said this was because there was preclearance of the interm plan, which was left in place until preclearance of the final plan was granted. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR interjected that all this oversight smacks of reconstruction bigotry. He characterized it as liberal elitism and said it is getting a little old. He wanted to know when some one would take the federal government on and stand up for Alaska. MR. BALDWIN said the law requires that ten years elapse without an objection, and the objection to the 1990 plan set Alaska's clock running again. SENATOR MILLER remarked that any reapportionment plan will draw an objection and the state will never get out from under preclerarance requirements, he added that it may be a good idea to reapportion every twenty years instead. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR said this type of bigotry should be thrown out and is insulting to the people of Alaska. He commented that there has been no discrimination against natives by Alaska's government since territorial days when the federal quthorities were in charge. SENATOR MILLER said he thinks both redistricting and the reapportionment board should be addressed together, preferably in one constitutional amendment rather that two. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR agreed and asked staff to bring them back a committee substitute that rolls the two bills together. MR. JEFF LOGAN mentioned that there are a few documents the committee may find instructive. He read from one of these documents that suggested there may be as few as 6,201 military and military dependents recorded in the 1990 census. MR. LOGAN remarked that the advisory board concluded there were not enough people to worry about, and they were unlikely to make a difference. Additionally, MR. LOGAN relayed to the committee a determination made by the former Attorney General Charlie Cole was that single member districts do not result in retrogression. CHAIRMAN TAYLOR asked if MR. LOGAN would assist in rolling the two bills together and MR. LOGAN agreed he would, to the extent he could.