Frank Torres
Orlando state Sen. Geraldine Thompson gave her constituents an update on the latest developments on changes to congressional and state senate districts at a redistricting town hall Thursday night. It was an effort to educate voters about who will be on the ballot in 2016.
Thompson began with a review of the Fair Districts act of 2010, which led to a Florida Supreme Court ruling that found the state’s congressional districts in violation of the law, which led lawmakers to concede the same for state Senate lines. She broke down the layout of each district by how they’re now drawn, and the possibility of how they could look under the proposed new maps.
The presentation then turned to the disputed parts of the map, particularly that of U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown‘s 5th Congressional District, David Jolly’s 13th District, Gwen Graham‘s 2nd District, and Daniel Webster‘s 10th District.
The redistricting controversy has led to candidates and lawmakers shuffling their 2016 plans. Thompson herself is one of those lawmakers. She recently declared she will run for the 10th state Senate District, which under the new maps would shift the district to favor a Democrat with high name recognition like herself.
“We had an educational forum for people who wanted to understand the redistricting process and to understand what legislators are doing,” Thompson told FloridaPolitics.com.
“We’re going to have to redraw the state Senate lines. People need to be communicating with their legislators and say, ‘We need you to do your job and we want you to draw fair districts.'”
