Andrew Cuomo appeared on Fred Dicker’s radio show this morning and had some gentle teasing for the good government groups that have been decrying this year’s redistricting process.
“What people forget when they get all hyped up about it–the legislature has the legal authority to draw the lines. It is in the Constitution. The good government groups forget that when they do their tirade about how terrible the lines are,” Mr. Cuomo said over the audible snorts of Mr. Dicker. “Constitutionally the legislature has the right to do it.”
After noting that the matter will likely go to court to see if the lines that the legislature ends up drawing are legal, Mr. Cuomo laid out his plan to reform the whole process by making nonpartisan redistricting the law of the land. He added that the lines as currently drawn are “hyper-political and offensive” and that he would veto them.
It is worth noting here that a Constitutional amendment won’t solve all of the redistricting process. An amendment would have to pass the legislature twice, and could easily be amended by the time it went into effect for the 2010 round of redistricting. Thus, some good-government types have been in the awkward position of opposing Mr. Cuomo’s plan to permanently deal with the problem, since they view it as a temporary, reversible fix.
Mr. Cuomo however said that if they don’t get a Constitutional amendment, this problem will keep occurring.
“Many of our friends nowadays have been around a short time. I remember going through this during the Pataki years, I remember it during the Mario Cuomo years. This will happen again in ten years. We just played the video tape at one point.I would like to see real reform.”