NYSCD22

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4. Hinchey's district faces pols' knife

http://www.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120302/NEWS/203020363/-1/NEWSLETTER100

Under rival redistricting plans coughed up under duress, both state Senate Republicans and Assembly Democrats would carve up retiring Rep. Maurice Hinchey's territory to help meet a requirement to purge two of New York's 29 congressional districts.

Each proposal would shift parts of Sullivan and Ulster counties — now entirely within Hinchey's 22nd District — to a neighboring district now represented by freshman Rep. Chris Gibson, a Republican from Columbia County.

But they would otherwise take radically different approaches to redrawing congressional lines in those two counties and in Orange.

Party leaders filed their respective maps in federal court late Wednesday night after a court-appointed special master ordered them to do so. The ruling majorities in the Senate and Assembly control the politically driven adjustment of state and federal legislative districts but have been unable to agree on the federal lines.