William Patrick
Watchdog.org
Florida’s prison inmates are often considered residents of the voting districts in which they’re incarcerated despite not being able to vote and typically residing in other areas of the state.
This results in outsized political representation for communities that have prisons, according to the Prison Policy Initiative. The nonprofit research group has been raising awareness about the issue since 2001.
The U.S. Census Bureau has always counted prisoners where they are confined, but mass incarceration over recent decades has led to redistricting distortions.
“Prison-based gerrymandering violates the constitutional principle of ‘One Person, One Vote,’” the initiative states.
The effects are evident in several North Florida state House districts.
According to the legislative demographic profile for House District 7, 19,825 people are incarcerated in state correctional facilities, or 12.7 percent of the 157,000 people composing the district.
In terms of representation, each group of 87 residents in District 7 has as much power in the state House as 100 residents in districts without a prison advantage.
“District 7 wouldn’t meet minimum constitutional population requirements without counting prisoners as if they were constituents,” Aleks Kajstura, legal director for the Prison Policy Initiative, told Watchdog.org.
In House District 5, 8.1 percent of the population is housed in state correctional facilities. In District 10, 5.4 percent is incarcerated. Voters in these House districts are afforded added influence.
The distortions are exacerbated in local elections, especially in low population counties.
Calhoun County has less than 15,000 total residents, but its 1,386 prisoners compose about half of its local District 4 constituency. The remaining District 4 residents are effectively given twice as much voting power as those living elsewhere in the county.
In Baker County, one in four District 1 residents is incarcerated, giving district voters 25 percent more say in the local government than voters living in other districts. Prisoners account for 20 percent of District 2 residents in Hardee County and 18 percent of District 1 residents in Wakulla County.
A Watchdog.org review of the Department of Corrections records and Jackson County district maps shows that four state correctional facilities are located in Jackson County’s 5th District, where 5,194 prisoners account for 53 percent of its residents.
Similar to Calhoun County, non-incarcerated District 5 voters enjoy twice as much influence in the local government as other county residents due to their proximity to the correctional institutions.
Since 1980, Florida's state prison population has increased five and one-half fold to about 110,000 prisoners, while the state’s total population has only doubled.
Since census data is used for redistricting purposes at all levels of government, the location of prisoners has taken on new importance.
Florida has the nation’s third largest prison system behind California and Texas. More than two million Americans are incarcerated nationwide.
The Census Bureau could alleviate the so-called gerrymandering nationwide by adjusting its residency rules to recognize inmates’ home addresses —which it didn’t do for the last decennial count in 2010. Exceptions have been made for students and Americans temporarily living overseas.
Last year, the Census Bureau published a proposed rule in the Federal Register allowing for public comment on its “2010 Census Residence Rule and Residence Situations.” Most of the public input dealt with prisoners, nearly all of which recommended counting pre-incarceration addresses.
Only six comments supported the practice of counting prisoners at prisons. The stated reasoning included administrative difficulties, unneeded complexity, potential inaccuracies and added expenses.
The bureau determined that changing course would violate its “usual residence” concept, a standard established in 1790.
"Usual residence” is defined as the place where a person lives and sleeps most of the time, which is not always the same as their legal residence, voting residence, or where they prefer to be counted," the bureau responded.
An extended commenting period ended on Thursday, Sept. 1. A final rule will be issued by the end of the year and will apply to the 2020 census.
State legislatures and local governments can also decide not to count prisoners as residents of correctional facilities when drawing voting districts.
New York and Maryland abolished the practice. The North Florida counties of Columbia, Hamilton, Holmes and Madison all adjusted their redistricting efforts to exclude prison inmates after 2010.
After the 2000 census, Gulf County was told by the state attorney general’s office to include its prisoners in its redistricting process. The local government refused rather than create a district where 80 percent of residents were incarcerated.
In March, a federal court ruled that Jefferson County unconstitutionally diluted the voting power of other voters by including prison inmates in the apportionment figures used to draw local district maps. It was the first federal court in the country to issue such an opinion, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. Other courts could soon follow.
Over 200 counties and municipalities nationwide, along with California and Delaware, are adjusting population counting methods to more accurately reflect actual residents prior to the 2020 census, according to the Prison Policy Initiative.
Kajstura called it an ad hoc solution the Census Bureau could easily rectify.