How you can share your thoughts with lawmakers on Illinois’ new congressional districts
The Illinois Senate and House will host a joint hearing in East St. Louis on Monday to give the metro-east community a chance to share their thoughts on redistricting.
Lawmakers are holding the hearings to get input from the public on drawing new legislative and congressional boundaries, a process that happens once every decade following a U.S. Census count.
Hearings have been held statewide this month, and southwestern Illinois’ hearing will take place virtually and in-person at 5 p.m. Monday, April 19. The hearing will also be broadcast live at www.ilga.gov but the public can also attend in-person at the Jackie Joyner-Kersee Center (101 Jackie Joyner-Kersee Circle, East St. Louis).
The public may request to provide testimony by submitting witness slips through the General Assembly’s website in advance of the hearing. They may also email their testimony request to redistrictingcommittee@senatedem.ilga.gov.
Social distancing and masks will be required for those who attend in-person.
The southwestern Illinois redistricting subcommittee is chaired by state Sen. Christopher Belt (D-Centreville), and vice-chaired by state Sens. Rachelle Crowe (D-Glen Carbon) and Doris Turner (D-Springfield).
Republicans have criticized this redistricting cycle because Democrats have said they can use population estimates from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey to redraw legislative boundaries instead of more detailed data that will be available later this year. The GOP says that data isn’t accurate enough because it relies on a sample of U.S. households, Capitol News Illinois reported.
Census counts were delayed because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Republicans introduced a bill that would give control to an independent commission that would draw the maps using the more detailed data, which won’t be available until the end of September.
The Census Bureau says data for congressional redistricting will be available by April 30.
Under the proposal, the Illinois Supreme Court would appoint a 16-member commission composed of seven Democrats, seven Republicans and two independents. An eight-member Legislative Redistricting Commission would also be formed.
The Illinois Constitution requires redistricting to be complete by June 30, but the Republican plan doesn’t expect the commission to meet that deadline. Instead, it would wait for the detailed Census data and then submit a plan within 30 days to the newly created Legislative Redistricting Commission.
This story was originally published April 17, 2021 at 8:00 AM.