No meetings scheduled yet to redraw Ohio maps after four rejections

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — It’s been 6 days since the Ohio Supreme Court has told lawmakers on the Ohio Redistricting Commission to get back to work after a fourth map was rejected.

Since then, no meetings have been scheduled to start re-drawing the maps for the Ohio General Assembly.

Voter’s rights advocates who have been following this mapmaking process for seven months are disappointed that a meeting has yet to be scheduled for the fifth set of maps.

“All along they really have shown such disrespect for the court and for the voters of Ohio,” said Mia Lewis with Common Cause Ohio.

The new deadline to redraw Ohio’s new legislative maps is now May 6 as Lewis hopes they will “get back to work.”

“It would be much preferable if they simply got to work and they called on the independent mapmakers which are available to come back, finish the work, and then we’re done,” Lewis said.

Democrats on the commission shared a letter Monday calling on their fellow commissioners to set a meeting for this week and to re-hire the independent mapmakers that were used during the fourth round of drawing.

“Before they abandoned the independent mappers — we really were creating a great map and that map was close to being done,” said Jen Miller with the League of Women Voters Ohio.

NBC4 reached out to Republican House and Senate leadership on a potential meeting — but was told there was no update at this point.

The last four maps were adopted by the Republican majority on the commission and have not had bipartisan agreement.

Miller said “I think it’s heartbreaking and I think it’s frustrating and I think these commissioners have a chance still to show that democracy can work and that there are some things more important than party.”

The federal courts could still get involved with a three-judge panel also eyeing the legislative map drawing process.

That panel named April 20 as the date they were looking at when it comes to progress on legislative map making.