With a legal deadline fast approaching, a vote Tuesday on redistricting was delayed amid a barrage of negative comments from the public.
The Jacksonville City Council's Rules Committee opted not to vote on new proposed maps for City Council and School Board that will determine the city's politics for the next decade, citing a forthcoming memo from the Office of General Counsel, the city's legal representation.
No amendments or changes to the maps were considered Tuesday, and only one was submitted: a proposal from District 3 Councilman Aaron Bowman to move a community of under 400 people from his district to district 13, due to current draft border separating it from the rest of the neighborhood.
District 10 Councilwoman Brenda Priestly Jackson, who chairs the Rules Committee, said the statement from OGC will address the legal aspects of the overwhelmingly negative feedback the maps received last month during four public hearings on the matter.
Council members were largely silent during those public hearings, and on Tuesday they also declined to substantively address allegations of racial gerrymandering and districts that favor incumbents.
Hundreds of comments on the maps have been submitted to the council, either through statements at the public hearings or through emails and phone calls to members.
According to Jackson, the comments have been compiled, and the ones council members "felt were germane" will be answered at the next Rules Committee meeting on March 15.
"That was a commitment we made to the public, and that is one I want to honor," Jackson said.
The earliest City Council can vote on whether to approve the drafted maps is March 22, assuming the Rules Committee votes on them the prior week. The council is required to pass the maps ordinance by April 12, or the process will be taken over by the state court system.
Voting rights organizations, including the ACLU and Northside Coalition of Jacksonville, have threatened the city with federal lawsuits if the maps are not changed. At the heart of the issue is the claim that the proposed maps dilute the voting power of Black residents by packing a majority into four of the city's 14 districts.
Jackson briefly touched on potential litigation by reminding council members on the committee that actions and statements made in meetings and hearings related to the redistricting process would be used as evidence in court.
Stating she was in a "meditative and prayerful posture," Jackson closed Tuesday's meeting by dismissing the idea the council had behaved in a way that would disadvantage Black voters.
Jackson, who is Black, noted that the council's current makeup has seven Black members, the most in the city's history.
"I would put to our neighbors that perhaps it's not so much the racial identification of individuals as it is policy variances," Jackson said. "An argument made that the actions of this council have thereby diluted the voice and vote of any group based solely on their ethno-racial identity, I think it's fraught at best."
