Senate Republicans Block Fair & Transparent Redistricting
Contact Name: Marina Altschiller
Phone: (603) 271-3207
CONCORD – Yesterday, Senate Republicans voted against a motion to remove SB 90 from the table to allow the bill to advance. If enacted, SB 90 would have ensured that resources available to legislative committees in their work on redistricting would be explicitly available to members of both the majority and minority party; it would have ensured that once a redistricting committee created or considered a map, it would have been made readily available to the public; and it would have required that any legislative committee meetings on redistricting would be open to the public. The bill had previously been laid upon the table in order to maintain a vehicle for fair and transparent redistricting efforts before the Senate. Whereas yesterday was the deadline for the Senate to act on all Senate bills, it would now take a suspension of Senate rules to move the bill forward.
After the vote, prime sponsor Senator Perkins Kwoka (D-Portsmouth) issued the following statement:
“Our intention in laying this bill on the table was to keep the critical conversation about fair and transparent redistricting before the Senate. This bill is a simple, commonsense approach to ensuring basic fairness and transparency in the redistricting process. Not only would this bill ensure public access to the redistricting process, it would have negated the public perception that these maps are drawn behind closed doors. SB 90 would have instilled confidence in New Hampshire voters, who deserve to be fairly represented in redistricting efforts and deserve to have their vote count. I am disappointed that, once again, my Republican colleagues have voted to block this bill from going forward.”
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