Opinion: New legislative maps might be leading us off the trail

This is a lousy time to be a mapmaker.

Especially if you’re a mapmaker trying to plot the exact boundaries of Central Washington’s ever-changing legislative districts, which are now awaiting a U.S. Supreme Court review.

We’ll spare you the whole history, but it started in the fall of 2021, when the Washington State Redistricting Commission failed to meet its deadline for updating Washington’s voting boundaries. State laws require the reviews every 10 years, and it’s up to the nonpartisan committee to make sure the boundaries reflect population trends and ensure that minority voters are fairly represented.

But the committee’s fumble put the ball in the hands of the court system, where the boundaries have been debated, redrawn and relitigated to the point where now, practically everyone is dissatisfied.

The latest maps, approved by U.S. District Court Judge Robert Lasnik, affect 13 districts statewide — and the impacts are dramatic.

Several current officeholders have been drawn out of their districts. In the Yakima Valley’s case, no incumbents are left in the 14th District, including longtime Sen. Curtis King, R-Yakima.

Legal objections to the redrawn lines wound up at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and on March 22, a three-judge panel from the court ruled that the latest map should stand.

That prompted an immediate legal response: a request to the U.S. Supreme Court for an injunction to block the new maps. It’s hard to guess what might happen with the request, if anything.

However it goes, it’s unlikely any of this will benefit Democrats. Yes, all of the displaced lawmakers are Republicans, but nearly every elected official east of the Cascades is a Republican. No matter how you draw the lines in Washington’s southeast or central districts, Republicans will still have the upper hand.

Nonetheless, Republicans now have what will sound to voters like a plausible grievance: Democrats, they’ll no doubt argue in upcoming campaigns, have tried to gerrymander their way into greater power.

At the same time, even though the baseline goal of redistricting is to protect minority voting rights, it’s difficult for Latinos to see how they’ll benefit. Voters in District 15 are losing a rising star in state Sen. Nikki Torres, R-Pasco, who’d have to run in District 16 when her term expires in two years unless she moves.

Torres voiced a legitimate sentiment that’s been growing louder in recent years:

“They assume every Latino or Hispanic person is a Democrat and that is not the case,” she said. “We don’t all vote the same.”

The new maps, of course, do accomplish some laudable goals. For the first time, the Yakama Nation isn’t split up — it’s all in one district. And in some areas, the lines unify likely voting blocs, preventing them from being diluted and drowned out in other districts.

Still, it’s hard to see how this realignment is going to satisfy much of anybody in the long run. It’s more than two years to get to this point, and we’ve still had to turn to the courts for help.

One way or another, we’ll have people representing us in Olympia next session. And what puts them there shouldn’t be their district number or even their party affiliation.

It should be their competence and their character. Period.

Speaking of competence, we hope the state redistricting commission can figure out how to do a better job of ignoring politics and basing their decisions strictly on common sense and census numbers.

Because somebody’s got to draw the line.