Latino groups offer legislative map

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Updated: August 4, 2011 4:20PM

With Illinois’ Latino population having grown by one-third in the past 10 years, an increase of nearly 500,000 residents, some might have expected a commensurate gain in Latino state legislators sent to Springfield.

But a proposed redistricting map put forward Monday by a collaboration of Latino advocacy groups indicates additions to the Latino legislative caucus will be few, if any, and whatever there is will have to be hard earned at the ballot box.

The legislative map drawn up by the Illinois Latino Agenda would create 17 districts in which Latino residents would comprise a majority and another three in which they would have a substantial enough minority to influence the outcome.

That compares to 12 districts that currently are represented by Latino state representatives or senators.

But a closer inspection of the numbers shows that few of the additional districts would have the 65 percent Latino majorities that traditionally have been viewed as the benchmark necessary to allow Latinos to elect one of their own.

That’s because creating a district with a majority of Latino residents — as calculated by the Census — does not necessarily translate into having a majority of Latino voters. Both citizenship issues and the relative youth of the Latino population — 40 percent are below the voting age — contribute to significantly reduced voter participation among Latinos.

In addition, the Latino population is so dispersed that it does not easily lend itself to capturing what voting power it does have.

If Illinois’ 2 million-plus Latinos were proportionally represented, they would be entitled to 28 Latino elected officials in the General Assembly, said Sylvia Puente, executive director of the Latino Policy Forum, a lead player in the coalition mapmaking effort.

Of course, we don’t do it quite that way, and thank goodness not. Federal laws to enhance minority representation through redistricting extend only to enabling minority groups to have an opportunity to “elect a candidate of their choice,” not necessarily to ensure election for someone from their minority group. That’s already closer to a racial quota system than many people would prefer, although those people tend to be white.

The coalition’s map seeks to create three new Latino majority legislative districts in the suburbs — with the best chance of actually electing a Latino coming from a Franklin Park-based House district that would have a Latino majority of 63 percent. That district also includes parts of Melrose Park, Bensenville and Mount Prospect.

New House districts with 56 percent Latino majorities would be created in Waukegan and the Elgin-Carpentersville area. That might not be enough for a Latino candidate to win election there, although it could in the future if populations trends continue.

While there also would be a new Latino district in Aurora, residents there have already elected a Latino representative.

In the city, Latinos might actually lose a Senate seat on the North Side because of population loss, although they could make it up with a possible gain on the Southwest Side, where the coalition would fashion six House districts and three Senate districts.

“There are no slam dunks,” Puente said. At best, she said, Latinos are looking a net gain of plus three.

The coalition map accedes to efforts by groups in Little Village and Back of the Yards to keep their communities intact instead of split among several legislative districts. But it would continue to split Cicero, where similar arguments were made. It was not immediately clear what the coalition map would do to the re-election prospects of Rep. Dan Burke, brother of City Council Finance Chairman Ed Burke, one of the last white legislators still representing an area with a Latino super-majority.

The map fashioned by a coalition of 49 groups serving the Latino community is only one proposal among many, all of which may eventually be ignored by state legislators, who have their own redistricting priorities.

Even a group behind the coalition map, the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund, said it’s not totally on board, preferring a different configuration for Southwest Side districts.

By getting its map out there before legislative leaders have revealed their own, the Latino Agenda puts pressure on lawmakers to take its suggestions into account — or explain afterward in court why they didn’t.

The first priority for Illinois Democrats, who control the process this year by virtue of their majority in both legislative chambers and occupying the governor’s office, is preserving their partisan numerical advantage for the decade to come.

And the first priority for all individual legislators is self-preservation, their ability to control that being somewhat limited.