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New York State Senator Elizabeth Little is challenging a new NYS law allocating incarcerated persons to their home districts for redistricting and reapportionment. Here is a copy [pdf] of her complaint.

The Center for Law and Social Justice, D­ēmos, LatinoJustice PRLDEF, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, the New York Civil Liberties Union, and the Prison Policy Initiative have joined the Brennan Center in seeking to defend the new law against the legal challenge brought by New York State Senator Elizabeth Little and others. [Click here for a copy of the motion to intervene [pdf]]

From the Brennan Center:

Previously, legislative districts with prisons were credited with the population of the disenfranchised people temporarily incarcerated there. This practice, often called prison-based gerrymandering, gives extra influence to voters who live in the district with the most prisons, and dilutes the votes of every resident of districts with fewer prisons. The new law corrects this bias, requiring that incarcerated persons be counted as residents of their home communities, in accordance with the New York State Constitution’s provision that incarceration does not change one’s residence. The legislation applies to state and local legislative redistricting, and would not affect federal funding distributions.

The most dramatic examples of prison-based gerrymandering are in upstate counties and cities. For example, half of a Rome City Council ward is incarcerated, giving the residents of that ward twice the influence of other city residents. Recognizing the distorting effect of prison-based gerrymandering at the local level, thirteen New York counties with large prisons – including four in Senator Little’s district – have historically exercised their discretion to remove the prison populations prior to redistricting.

The new law brings consistency to redistricting in New York, prohibiting the state and all local governments from giving extra political influence to districts that contain prisons. Sen. Little’s lawsuit seeks to have the new legislation struck down, the effect of which would require legislative districts – most notably her own, which contains 12,000 incarcerated persons – to include prison populations in their apportionment counts to the detriment of all other districts without prisons.

Be sure to let Ms. Little know that her lawsuit is a monumental waste of resources, is antithetical to fundamental civil rights and democracy, and a violation of the NYS Constitution.

Ms. Little can be contacted via email at little@nysenate.gov. Little may also be contacted at one of her offices: Albany Office, 188 State Street Room 310, Legislative Office Building, Albany, NY 12247, Phone: (518) 455-2811; District Office, 5 Warren Street Suite 3 Glens Falls, NY 12801, Phone: (518) 743-0968; District Office 2, 137 Margaret Street Suite 100, Plattsburgh, NY 12901, Phone: (518) 561-2430.

See also: Prison District Profile – Betty Little’s Senate District 45 [pdf]

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