Opinion ID: 1435299
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 23

Heading: Getty Petitioners' Alternative Plan

Text: The Getty Petitioners have proposed an alternative plan that redraws only Districts 1 through 5. Under the alternative plan submitted by the Getty Petitioners, each of the five westernmost counties of Garrett, Allegany, Washington, Frederick and Carroll will have to share legislative districts with other counties. The alternative plan proposed by the Getty Petitioners would place Delegate Kevin Kelly and Speaker of the House Casper Taylor, both of whom are Democrats, in the same single member subdistrict, but would not require any incumbent Republicans to run against each other. The Getty Petitioners acknowledge that the relief they are seeking in western Maryland will require changes in legislative district boundaries elsewhere in the State and will affect districts beyond those that are adjacent to the five western Maryland districts the Getty petitioners seek to reconfigure. However, the Getty Petitioners have not submitted a workable statewide plan nor any plan that purports to demonstrate how the changes to other districts elsewhere in the State necessitated by their requested remedy can be made in a manner that satisfies the requirements of Federal and State law. With respect to the State-wide Getty Plan (Getty Plan), Christian Cavey testified on behalf of the Getty Petitioners that he had not prepared a map, but he had prepared a spreadsheet which he believed to be the basis for the map submitted as Getty Exhibit 34-4. The map submitted as Exhibit 34-4, however, is both technically and substantively flawed. Under the Getty Plan, portions of Districts 6, 8A, 44A and 44B are discontiguous, and a deviation from the ideal district population range from -18.38% to +6.06% for a maximum population variance of 24.42%. Representation of Baltimore City residents is reduced to five districts and a two member subdistrict, with three majority black Senate districts, two majority white Senate districts, and a majority white two member subdistrict, connected to a majority white one-member subdistrict in Baltimore County. Six incumbent Democratic Senators are paired with each other in District 7 (Sen. Collins and Sen. Stone), District 40 (Sen. Mitchell and Sen. Hughes), and District 47 (Sfikas and McFadden). No incumbent Republican Senators are paired in any district. Incumbent Democratic Delegates will run against each other in Districts 1, 7, 41, 42, 46 and 47A. No incumbent Republican Delegate need run against another Republican Delegate (in District 8A two Republican incumbents would be placed in a two member subdistrict with a Democratic incumbent, and in District 12A, Del. Murphy, a Republican, would be placed in a single member subdistrict with a Democratic incumbent).