This is the first week the public will get a chance to weigh in on how Connecticut’s political lines should be drawn.
But not many members of the public took lawmakers up on the offer.
“Redistricting might not sound like voting rights. But it is,” Laura Smits, president of the League of Women Voters, said. “After all the way districts are drawn determines who is on the ballot.”
Smits was one of three people to testify at a public hearing last night in Hartford.
“If voters don’t feel their vote will count because of the way their district is drawn or feel that their preferred candidate has little chance of prevailing. They don’t vote. Voter alienation equals voter suppression,” Smits said.
Once every 10 years, a bipartisan group of lawmakers is required to adjust the political lines to reflect the results of the U.S. Census and ensure voters in each district get equal representation.
This afternoon, only four people signed up to testify at a public hearing in Norwich.
