Concerns raised about consultant

J. Craig Anderson

Saturday, Oct. 8, 2005 | 11:41 a.m.

The consultant that Clark County is hiring to redraw commissioners' districts favored whites and Republicans during a statewide redistricting in Arizona, according to critics.

But a top official at the Claremont, Calif.-based National Demographics Corp. said his company merely got caught in the crossfire of a partisan political battle, which is not uncommon during a major redistricting effort.

Rapid growth has made it necessary to revise Clark County's seven commissioners' districts. The current district lines are based on population data from the 2000 Census, but the county's population increased from 1.38 million in 2000 to 1.75 million in 2004 -- a 27 percent jump.

"The reality is, if we don't do something, three of us will end up representing 70 percent of the county residents," Commissioner Lynette Boggs McDonald, a Republican who represents District F, said during a meeting Tuesday where the matter was discussed.

Just about any time district lines are redrawn concerns are raised about whether the new boundaries will increase or decrease the ability of minorities to elect their favored candidates.

Michael Mandell, a lawyer who has represented Hispanic and American Indian groups in an ongoing lawsuit in Arizona, said National Demographics was hired by the voter-approved Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission in 2000 to update the state's legislative and congressional districts.

But the commission and National Demographics skewed district lines to place ethnic minorities and Democrats at a disadvantage, Mandell alleges.

"My clients felt that NDC placed too many minorities in the same districts," thus minimizing the number of districts in which they would have political influence, he said Thursday.

In January 2004, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Kenneth Fields ruled in favor of Mandell's clients, collectively known as the Arizona Minority Coalition for Fair Redistricting.

Fields' ruling said that the method used to reapportion Arizona's legislative districts in 2001 violated the state's constitution. In particular, the districts did not follow an amendment requiring "competitiveness" between groups with opposing views in each district.

"The plaintiffs all have a significant interest in the redistricting process and all have suffered palpable injury because of the commission's actions in failing to favor the creation of competitive legislative districts," the ruling states.

The redistricting map Fields reviewed was not the first map produced by National Demographics and the commission. The first was rejected by the Justice Department, which is required by federal law to scrutinize election changes in areas with a history of discrimination against minorities.

Justice officials focused on one particular district in southern Arizona in which the commission had refused to include a group of Hispanics.

The Justice Department's written decision stated that the map "raised concerns regarding the ability of the (commission) to establish that this action, which had a retrogressive effect, may also have been taken, at least in part, with a retrogressive intent."

Mandell said such language is typically about as far as the department will go, stopping just short of accusing the commission of discrimination.

He added that the rejected map cost Arizona taxpayers $570,000, nearly half of which went to National Demographics. The total cost included $35,000 for hotel rooms and meetings at upscale resorts.

National Demographics Vice President Douglas Johnson said he isn't surprised by Mandell's characterization of his company because it mirrors accusations Mandell has made since filing the lawsuit in 2002.

However, Johnson said Mandell, who is the Arizona Senate's Democratic general counsel, made conflicting statements about National Demographics during the legal proceedings.

Court documents indicate in some instances, Mandell said National Demographics encouraged the commission to make the districts more competitive, but was ignored. At other points, he said the company was complicit in the effort to discriminate.

"In some stages we're the evil consultants, in others we're the wise and learned consultants," Johnson said Thursday.

Jeff Martin, Assistant Development Services manager for Mesa, Ariz., said National Demographics created voting districts for that city in 1998. He said the company did a "tremendous" job, exceeding his expectations particularly when it came to gathering public input.

The consultants did everything they could to ensure fair representation for Mesa's Hispanic voters, he added.

Johnson said Fields' ruling is currently being reviewed by an appeals court, which has allowed Arizona's revised legislative map to be used in the meantime.

Fields put a lot of emphasis on the importance of competitiveness, he said, relative to other key factors such as respecting traditional community boundaries and creating districts that make sense geographically.

Since the new map took effect, no seats held by black or American Indian officials have been lost, Johnson said, and the number of Hispanic legislators has increased by 25 percent.

However, that doesn't mean the Arizona redistricting has aided Democrats.

"They lost seats," he said.

Richard Siegel, a political scientist and the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada's board president, said racially homogenous districts tend to favor Republicans, and mixed districts are generally better for Democrats.

Still, minority communities often don't want to be split into multiple districts, even though it would increase their political power, he said. Elected incumbents concerned about re-election usually don't encourage the formation of more competitive districts, either.

"There is nothing more contentious in American politics than redistricting," Siegel said, adding that even the U.S. Supreme Court has made contradictory decisions about how it should be done.

Clark County's redistricting is not likely to be as controversial as congressional or legislative changes would be, said Don Burnette, chief administrative officer of Clark County's administrative services department.

The county is currently in contract negotiations with National Demographics to determine how much work the consulting firm will perform, and how much will be done by county staff.

"We've been very pleased with their work to this point," he said.

Still, Burnette said the consultants won't get the final say when it comes to drawing new lines through Clark County communities.

"I see that responsibility in the process falling on (county) staff," he said.