Inmate populations skew representation (FL-Skews Cong Districts R)

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/8980302.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp&ERIGHTS=-1117967144692808945miami::[e-mail]&KRD_RM=9ppqvrppryypttwttwtppppppp|mark|N

One major player in Florida's seemingly endless voting rights controversies is the criminal-justice system.

Recently, debates have centered around the merits of ex-felon disenfranchisement and finding a fair method of removing ex-felons from voter rolls. But there is another, much more subtle way in which the criminal-justice system is corrupting democracy in Florida.

Currently, the Census Bureau counts prison inmates as residents of the congressional and state legislative districts in which they are incarcerated. This affects population data and, by extension, legislative redistricting.

Because Florida's prisons are disproportionately located in rural Republican areas, the inmate population increases the voting power of Republicans at the expense of Democrats.

[xxqqqzme]

1. ok, now that is

totally f**ked. Bet a rethug came up w/ that one! Either they get counted in both instances or in neither. How can a prison population B counted as voter representation when they're not allowed 2 vote?

[olddem43]

2. Yeah, they should only count 3/5 of them!

[Judi Lynn]

3. More from the article:

Take, for example, Union County, a very rural county in northern Florida. In 2000, as measured by the Census Bureau, Union had a population of 13,442. Of this number, however, almost 4,000 -- a whopping 30 percent -- were inmates. Next door, Bradford County housed another 3,250 inmates.

Because these inmates were counted as residents of the congressional and state legislative districts that include these counties, voters in Union, Bradford and other nearby counties are overrepresented in these legislative bodies.

Meanwhile, the counties that convict and send thousands of inmates to prisons in places like Union and Bradford, and thereby lose representation, are mostly urban.

It is important to note that the issue of counting inmates in rural Republican districts doesn't dilute the votes of the inmates -- after all, they couldn't vote no matter where they were counted. Rather, it dilutes the votes of ordinary residents of the districts from where the inmates come. The criminal-justice system should not be allowed to reshape Florida's political landscape by arbitrarily reallocating representation to rural Republicans.
(snip/...)

This is simply asinine. Why hasn't this problem been such a trauma in OTHER STATES?

Maybe the truly stupid people in Florida are the ones who think we should buy this baloney.

[rinsd]

5. I'm not so sure....

....I don't see how this is affecting anything really. See my post below on the Senate and House districts.

It doesn't seem like these places got an extra rep.

Though I would agree that when you purposefully disenfranchise people they shouldn't be counted for terms of drawing districts, I just don't see the effect or dillution of vote.

Couldn't you apply the same for the Census counting illegal aliens who cannot vote? Weird....

[rinsd]

4. Questions....ANSWERED...sort of...is this a non-issue?

The article does not mention how FL's legislative branch is set up and I am unaware of it so if someone could assist, I would appreciate it. Do these districts with prison get more legislators? It sounds like these counties are so small even with the prison pop boost they would get the same amount of legislators.

While writing this post I did some checking.

The Senate district is the 14th and consists of Alachua, Bradford, Gilchrist, Union, and parts of Columbia, Levy, Marion, and Putnam counties.

The House district for Union & parts of Bradford(also includes Baker, Nassau, and parts of Clay & Duval) is the 12th and it has one rep. The other district which has the other parts of Braford is the 21st (also includes Putnam and parts of , Clay, Lake, Marion, Volusia).

The Senator for this area is a Dem and the Reps are GOPers.

How in the world is prison pop effecting disproportionate voting power when these tiny counties share one legislator? Any FL legislative experts out there?