I was misquoted in the article in the May 6, 2011 issues of the Herald Courier and Williston Times on the redistricting of the Nassau County Legislature. I told the reporter that, pursuant to the county attorney, the configuration of the current Nassau County Legislative districts is unconstitutional – not the proposed map of new districts.
I informed your reporter that the current 2nd Legislative District is over-populated. The 2nd District is a district in which minority voters make up a majority of the voters. The population in that district is 14.5 percent over the legally permissible population count. Other districts are under-populated (e.g., the 12th Legislative District has 8.2 percent less than the permissible population). The total discrepancy in population from district to district countywide is 22.7 percent. This discrepancy violates the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
As a result of this discrepancy, the votes for the office of county legislator in the over-populated district have proportionally less value than votes in other legislative districts, especially those that are under-populated districts. This discrepancy is well beyond what the courts, and Constitution, will allow, especially when the over-population occurs in a district in which minorities make up a majority of the voters. In short, what I explained to your reporter is that I believe that a court would likely find that the current legislative districts violate the constitutional principal of “one man – one vote”, and the newly drawn map does not.
A new map of legislative districts in compliance with the Equal Protection Clause should be implemented to correct the unconstitutionality of the current maps.
Nassau County Legislator Richard J. Nicolello (R-Dist. 9)
