Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita visited Warsaw Wednesday night to discuss a proposal for redistricting legislative and congressional districts.
Rokita also was in Warsaw to attend a political support event for Jim Banks, Columbia City, a candidate seeking the State Senate District 17 seat in the May primary.
Senator Gary Dillon, who currently holds the District 17 seat, announced his retirement earlier this year.
Lawmakers will draw new legislative redistricting maps in 2011, based on the 2010 census data, according to Rokita.
The plans are for the new redistricting criteria to redraw district lines that can help create a system that is fair, sensible and serves the voters, not the legislators, according to Rokita.
Rokita said the key to redistricting is lowering voter confusion and increasing the participation in government and voter turnout.
The key goals are to have the redistricting maps drawn in such a way that districts are compact and keep communities in a single district rather than split into two or more.
Prohibiting use of political data for partisan purposes will ensure redistricting reform, according to Rokita.
Rokita said Governor Mitch Daniels has a say and a veto vote in redistricting. He said Daniels has publicly said he supports signing a bill that has redistricting maps in it that look like the concepts Rokita has drawn up for redistricting.
Rokita said a redistricting concept that still needs to be addressed is nesting. Nesting is where two House districts are put into a Senate district and that can be done because there are 100 representatives and 50 senators.
Rokita's redistricting proposal calls for splitting each of the 50 state Senate districts into two House districts.
"What that does is form a known community boundary in a county where 99 percent of the time voters will know who their congressman is because county lines will be followed," Rokita said.
Under the proposed redistricting plan, a resident living in a specific township or city also will know who their state representative is because those lines will follow known community boundaries.
He said it has been promising that there have been representatives in the House and Senate expressing their commitments to redistricting reform.
He said some legislators and groups have recommended moving the redistricting responsibility instead to an independent commission.
More important than who draws the redistricting maps is establishing criteria for how the maps are drawn, according to Rokita.
Rokita said he finds the House Republicans call for transparency and a minimal use of political data promising.
However, he also said the legally unnecessary and overly tight restriction on population deviation is what we have now.
Traditional boundaries, including boundaries for counties, should be followed as much as possible in drawing House, Senate and Congressional districts, according to Rokita.
Banks, if elected, will represent Kosciusko, Huntington, Whitley, Wabash, Grant and Allen counties.Banks, 30, has served as a county councilman in Whitley County since 2008 and is director of business development for Hagerman Inc., Fort Wayne.
If he is elected to the State Senate District 17 seat, he will be the youngest state legislature to serve currently.
Banks' opponents in the May primary for the seat are Ron Fusselman and Tom Wall, both Huntington County Republicans.
"I want to work to make sure there are job opportunities in rural areas, and I will take a rural economic development mind set to the legislature," Banks said.
Banks said if he is successful in obtaining the seat, he will have the opportunity to vote on the redistricting issue and said he supports Rokita's views on the topic.
