Activists insist on 7 minority districts in city
A day after a three-judge panel struck down the House's redistricting plan for Boston, lawyers and voting rights advocates vowed to oppose any revision that creates fewer than seven districts where blacks and Latinos make up a majority of the voting-age population.
The plan struck down by the court included five such districts. There were six before House Speaker Thomas M. Finneran and his key lieutenants redrew the boundaries in spring 2001. The judges have given the House six weeks to redraw several Boston districts to give the city's black community political power commensurate with its numbers. Before they submit the revised plan to the judges, the ruling says, legislators must allow the plaintiffs in the case to comment on it.
"We will remain vigilant as the remedy is set in motion," said Gibran Rivera, chairman of Mass VOTE, a plaintiff in the suit filed in June 2002.
The plaintiffs and their supporters said they will insist on changes in the districts of Shirley Owens-Hicks, Elizabeth A. Malia, and Finneran himself. Under the House plan, Owens-Hicks's district is "packed" with black and Latino voters, Malia's went from majority-minority to majority white, and the proportion of voting-age blacks and Latinos in Finneran's district went from 74 percent to 60 percent.
Speaking at Suffolk University Law School yesterday, several lawyers and advocates allied with the plaintiffs rejected Secretary of State William F. Galvin's contention that the ruling would throw this year's legislative races into chaos. They argued that it should be fairly easy to create districts that pass muster under the federal Voting Rights Act, especially with the latest redistricting software. Atiya Dangleben, program director of Mass VOTE, said drafting an acceptable plan "is a matter of precincts" and "will not be expensive or time-consuming in any way."
"This is not going to cause chaos," said David H. Harris Jr. of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "We're looking at five African-American and two Latino districts if the maps are drawn the way they should have been drawn."
Some of the advocates suggested that Finneran could adopt the plan put forth by the plaintiffs -- but the speaker is unlikely to go that route. For one thing, one of the legislators whose district would be transformed from majority-white to majority-minority is Representative Eugene L. O'Flaherty, one of Finneran's top lieutenants. Malia and Representative Jeffrey Sanchez would be in the same situation. The plaintiffs' plan would transform Representative Martin J. Walsh's district from majority-minority to majority white, creating a net gain of two majority-minority districts.
O'Flaherty, who represents Charlestown and part of Chelsea, said the Boston delegation resolved in a meeting yesterday to work as quickly as possible to put out a map that minority groups, the court, and lawmakers can all live with. "What I heard today was, `Let's do this in as collegial a fashion as possible, let's do it quickly, openly, and get the plaintiffs involved so it is transparent,' " O'Flaherty said. "The sense I get from the entire Boston delegation is that all of us want it concluded as rapidly as feasible."
One top Beacon Hill Democrat said Finneran and the attorney who has helped generate district maps, Lawrence DiCara, will put forth a new plan in about a week.
Although Finneran and his fellow Boston legislators said they were resigned to the panel's ruling, several said they did not appreciate the tone adopted by the judges, who chastised House leaders for protecting themselves at the expense of black voters' rights.
Walsh, a Dorchester Democrat whose district abuts Finneran's, called the court's ruling "unfortunate," adding, "I didn't see any holes in the plan, but we have to do what we have to do."
Representative Brian P. Golden, who represents neighborhoods in Brighton and Brookline, said he was shocked by the decision's tone: "As an attorney, I thought that the language in the ruling was unduly harsh and intemperate," he said.
Representative Marie St. Fleur, a Haitian immigrant, questioned the court's emphasis on black and white, noting that her own district is a mix of Haitians, Jamaicans, Cape Verdeans, and African-Americans who don't necessarily share the same interests.
"You can't paint Boston with the same sort of black and white brush that you used to in the past, because we are a much more diverse Boston," St. Fleur said. "The diversity exists in the Latino community, and it exists in the African-American community."
Meanwhile, Governor Mitt Romney said yesterday he sees the ruling as a chance to enhance voter equality in the capital city.
"I hope that in the redistricting that comes forward from the Legislature -- or from the court -- that we're finally able to see greater representation of minorities in Boston," Romney said.
Later, Romney's spokeswoman said the Republican governor also is intrigued by a proposal by Common Cause Massachusetts that would establish an independent commission to control the decennial redistricting process -- thereby reducing the influence of lawmakers such as Finneran.
Romney, however, does not support Common Cause's idea of amending the constitution.
Globe correspondent Matthew Rodriguez contributed to this report.
