Crowell introduces legislation to make redistricting process more open

Saying he wants to end the secrecy, state Sen. Jason Crowell introduced a proposed constitutional amendment Wednesday that would require all meetings regarding redistricting be open to the public.

If passed by voters, the law would correct what Crowell feels was a serious mistake made by the judicial panel that recently redrew Missouri's House and Senate maps behind closed doors.

"The redistricting process and drawing of representative and Senate district lines are so fundamental to our democratic process that such activity should never occur in secret," Crowell said.

Every 10 years, Missouri is constitutionally responsible for redrawing the districts based on new census data. The process begins with governor-appointed bipartisan commissions.

Having failed to come to a consensus about what the new boundaries should look like, the Missouri Constitution requires the maps then be drawn by a six-member panel of appellate judges picked by the state Supreme Court.

The judicial commission has been widely criticized for drawing the maps in private without explanation and without public input. To make matters worse, Crowell said, after the judicial panel's first Senate map was released to significant public criticism, the panel again met without publicizing it and made changes a week later to some of the new Senate districts.

"I think people would be very troubled if the General Assembly legislated by press release -- if there were no public votes, no public debate, no discussion," Crowell said. "Just because we have judges draw it doesn't mean it should be a secretive judicial process."

If the joint resolution clears the Senate and the House, the matter would be put to a statewide vote. Crowell hopes that would happen in November.

Several people spoke out in favor of Crowell's proposal Wednesday.

Cape Girardeau resident Kathy Swan was a Republican member of the Senate apportionment commission that failed to agree on how the new Senate map should look. But she said on Thursday all of their meetings were in public.

Swan was "surprised and disappointed" that the judicial panel felt it could hold secret meetings.

"The judges felt they were not subject to the Sunshine Law," Swan said. "They either thought they were above the law or it didn't apply to them."

Jean Maneke is a lawyer for the Missouri Press Association, specializing in open-meetings laws. She said the existing laws already mandate that the meetings the judges held should have been open to the public.

"But any time there's confusion in the law, one of the ways to remedy it is to restate the law," Maneke said. "So I would think it would be a good idea to have this type of law on the books. It reiterates what the current law is."

For their part, the judges involved are still staying quiet. Judge Lisa White Hardwick of the Western District Court of Appeals was the chairwoman of the judicial commission that redrew the districts. On Wednesday, she declined to comment on the commission's actions or to Crowell's proposal.

Instead, she referred to the commission's legal counsel, Jim Layton, of the state Attorney General's office. Nancy Gonder, spokeswoman of the attorney general's office, said they were also declining comment. Gonder cited "the possibility of litigation" as the reason for the office's silence.

Senate President Pro Tem Rob Mayer, R-Dexter, said while he hasn't studied Crowell's resolution, he at least initially supports the efforts.

"I don't know why they shouldn't operate in the open like the citizens commission did," Mayer said. "I think this is a step in the right direction."

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