It's back to the drawing board with the new JP district maps of Mississippi County, per the decision made by the Mississippi County Election Commission during a public meeting Friday.
Justices present at the meeting were given the opportunity to peruse copies of the second draft produced by Rob Middleton through the East Arkansas Planning and Development District, as part of the county's redistricting process. A second draft had been requested for several reasons, one being that the first draft placed Justices Emmanuel Lofton and Hattie Middlebrook in the same district, which would mean the Court would possibly lose the representation of a minority justice.
The maps are drawn digitally, using a computer program to place new district lines based on population -- and are then presented to the Election Commission for perusal and corrections. The second draft for Mississippi County placed Justice Lofton in the same district with Justice Adonis Hopper.
"My only problem with this," said Hopper, "is that I am a rural JP, and this places me in the city, and it takes a city JP [Lofton] and places him in a rural area. I would prefer to be elected in a rural district because that is where I live and what I know."
Mississippi County Judge Randy Carney, who was also present at the meeting, suggested that another try be made at making the representation more fair and equal.
"I don't think anyone expected for the first or even the second draft to be right," he said. "The first draft was fair, but Justice Lofton had a valid point, and with this second one, Justice Hopper has a fair point too. But now we have something to work with. I think we need to go back to Rob [Middleton] and try to remedy this issue with Justice Hopper's district."
Lofton spoke up on the issue of justices competing with each other for the 11 seats on the court, out of what is currently 13.
"My initial concern was that the first draft would lower the number of minority reps on the Quorum Court," Lofton said. "Everyone should have competition, that's what it's all about. If we try to eliminate everyone having competition, that's gerrymandering as far as I'm concerned. We will have to run against each other, some of us -- that's just part of it."
Commissioner Tom Wiktorek pointed out during this discussion that the new maps do not affect any of the justices as they sit now, but will take effect for the next election season, and all justices may have new competition at that point regardless of what happens with the redistricting.
The main point of concern for some JPs and members of the commission is the unavoidable combination of city and rural areas into single districts.
"City and rural areas have two different sets of needs and wants. They need separate representatives," said Justice Robert Earl Davis. "A rural JP drives those roads and sees the needs every day, where a city JP would not often go out there. People in rural areas need to be elected in rural areas, and people in the city need to be elected in the city -- it's altogether different."
After discussion, it was decided that the commission will request the third draft be re-drawn three different ways: one in which the process of adding people to each district will begin in the center of the densely populated areas and working outward, one which will focus on keeping district lines as close to newly drawn Blytheville city ward lines as possible and working outward in the county from there, and one which focuses only on the issue in the district of Justices Hopper and Lofton.
The process is moving along quickly, according to Tyler Dunegan of the Secretary of State's Office, who was also present at the meeting.
"Mississippi County is miles ahead of many other counties in doing this work," he said. He also promised the help of the Secretary of State's office, should the commission want a second opinion on any of the maps.
While the deadline for completed redistricting maps is not until January, the commission hopes to complete the process as soon as possible.
sharris@blythevillecourier.com