Opinion ID: 6215878
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The commission reconvenes

Text: {¶ 4} On January 16, 2022—four days after we issued our decision invalidating the original district plan—the commission announced that it would reconvene on January 18. The commission’s announcement stated that individual commission members were instructing their respective staff members to “begin identifying possible areas to address the court’s ruling regarding Section 6 of the Ohio Constitution” and that commission members would “have access to other commission members’ relevant staff and contractors.” {¶ 5} On January 17, Ray DiRossi and Blake Springhetti, who worked for the Senate and House Republican Caucuses, respectively, and who were the map drawers for the commission’s original district plan, met with staffers for the Senate and House Democratic Caucuses and Chris Glassburn, a consultant retained by the Democratic legislative caucuses for map-drawing purposes. Among other things, they all seem to have agreed that they would use election data from all statewide federal and state partisan elections from 2016 to 2020.2 2. Article XI, Section 6(B)’s proportionality standard refers to “statewide state and federal partisan general election results during the last ten years.” Ohio Constitution, Article XI, Section 6(B); see also League of Women Voters of Ohio, __ Ohio St.3d __, 2022-Ohio-65, __ N.E.3d __, at ¶ 105. In their objections, petitioners have not contested the commission’s use of statewide election results from 2016 to 2020 rather than from the entire ten-year period. 3 SUPREME COURT OF OHIO {¶ 6} During the January 18 commission meeting, Governor Mike DeWine administered the oath of office to a new commission member, House Minority Leader Allison Russo, who replaced Representative Emilia Sykes.3 Some of the commission members expressed their understanding of the commission’s task in light of this court’s ruling. Yet the commission members did not engage in any map drawing or otherwise specifically explain how they intended to redraw the district plan. {¶ 7} After the meeting, staff representatives of each commission member met and agreed to continue meeting in the days ahead. At some point, the commission members decided to take a “regional” approach to the map-drawing process. On January 19, DiRossi and Springhetti began emailing other staff representatives possible changes to House and Senate districts in different regions of the state, requesting feedback. DiRossi and Springhetti started with proposed changes in Franklin and Hamilton Counties and later sent a proposal regarding Lorain County. On January 20, Glassburn replied with the “[D]emocratic responses” to the proposals for Franklin and Hamilton Counties.