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Permalink Reply by Jason W on June 29, 2012 at 10:18am

This is one of the many reasons this is the most corrupt city in the country. And BTW, they do NOT do this for white districts.

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Permalink Reply by John Greenfield on June 29, 2012 at 10:42am

As Alderman Moreno pointed out, in the past gerrymandering was used to subdivide communities of color and make sure a maximum number of white aldermen were elected, excluding minorities from City Council. Nowadays, Moreno argues, gerrymandering is used in a positive sense, to give minorities the opportunity to elect aldermen who will represent their interests, whether or not those aldermen are the same ethnicity as the majority of their constituents.

In fact, gerrymandering is still used to create majority white districts, which is why Alderman Fioretti has a problem now. The old Second Ward on the Near South Side included a significant number of African Americans. To make sure that the city didn't lose too many majority-black wards in the remap, those black residents were removed from Fioretti's majority-white district and added to other wards.

To accomplish this, the Second Ward was flipped to include the Near North Side, and carefully gerrymandered to include an overwhelming majority of whites. So race isn't Fioretti's main obstacle to reelection. It's that literally no one in his new ward voted for him last time.

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Permalink Reply by Adam Herstein on June 29, 2012 at 10:54am

Why can't we just have the wards coordinate with the official community areas? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_areas_of_Chicago

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Permalink Reply by Jason W on June 29, 2012 at 10:57am

Correct me if I'm wrong John, but doesn't federal law require that they have enough wards of hispanic and black majority? The fact that there are white majority wards is only because they couldn't be dumped into wards where they would be the minority (subdivided like you said), so they are put together in one ward. And let's not forget the biggest worry of the democratic machine. Keeping anyone who would vote republican, libertarian, or anything else subdivided and without representation.

And Fioretti must have pissed off the machine some how. It was all politics and not geographical /demographic reasons he lost his little kingdom. Did anyone see the proposed maps as this was being put together? The ward boundaries were flying all over the place.

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Permalink Reply by John Greenfield on June 29, 2012 at 11:07am

I believe you are correct that the Voting Rights Act mandates that Latino and African-American communities not be subdivided into different districts.

Here's an NBC piece that argues that losing his district was Fioretti's "reward for ousting a pair of black politicians": http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/Bob-Fiorettis-Reward-1377...

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Permalink Reply by David on June 29, 2012 at 2:45pm

IANAL, but to be clear, the Voting Rights Act itself definitely does not mandate majority-minority districts in places like Chicago.  That's pretty much exactly the question that was at issue in  Bartlett v. Strickland.    It's possible that Chicago has some old court order mandating majority-minority districts, but I doubt it since it would probably be mentioned in the news reports if that were the case. 

Sure, if the council went out of its way to eliminate black-majority wards in the way that was done in the past, the city would lose a VRA suit on that pretty quickly.    In theory, though, race-neutral districting is completely allowable under the VRA.  However, defending race neutral options in lawsuits is expensive.  It's much easier to simply create the majority-minority districts and keep the courts off your back.

Anyway, I really don't understand the original post here, John.   The conclusion of your articles concludes that the gerrymandering "has more to do with politicians’ self-preservation than common sense.”  But your question above presupposes that the purpose of the gerrymandering is to better reflect demographics.   While there's some overlap, those are mostly two very different things.  Do you have an opinion on which of those things is true (or rather, more true)?  

John Greenfield said:

I believe you are correct that the Voting Rights Act mandates that Latino and African-American communities not be subdivided into different districts.

 

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Permalink Reply by John Greenfield on June 29, 2012 at 6:40pm

The article presents two opposing viewpoints, Moreno's and Bailey's. The conclusion that gerrymandering "has more to do with politicians’ self-preservation than common sense” is Bailey's, not mine.

I haven't completely wrapped my head around this issue yet, but my sense is that gerrymandering has both negative and positive aspects. I agree with Bayley that the boundaries have a lot to do with aldermen trying to keep their jobs (or make other aldermen lose their jobs, as seems to be the case with Fioretti), and it makes it more difficult to provide city services.

But I also agree with Moreno that gerrymandering may still be necessary to make sure that minorities get fair representation in city council. After all, before the remap Latinos were underrepresented at City Hall, and even after the remap whites are likely to be somewhat overrepresented.

So perhaps gerrymandering is still a necessary evil, but hopefully as we move towards a more equitable society in the future it won't be necessary.

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