Lawmakers including Senate President Don Harmon, D-Oak Park, center, shown last year, will reconvene in Springfield next week on the legislative remap, even though Democrats passed it earlier without needing Republican input. (Erin Hooley / Chicago Tribune)

       The Democratic-led Illinois House and Senate committees on redistricting have scheduled at least seven public hearings in advance of a special session set for next week to update previously approved legislative boundaries using recently released federal Census data.

       “The maps passed in May were drawn with the best data available at the time. Now that the long-awaited Census data has arrived, we will make adjustments as needed,” Sen. Omar Aquino, D-Chicago, who chairs the Senate Redistricting Committee, said in a statement on Monday.

       Rep. Elizabeth Hernandez, D-Cicero, who chairs the House Redistricting Committee, said the hearings will be an attempt “to make sure all voices are heard as we update our legislative map to reflect the most recent data.”

       The hearing schedule comes after House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch of Hillside and Senate President Don Harmon of Oak Park on Friday called for the special session to enact changes to the map Democrats approved in May, which was signed into law by Gov. J.B. Pritzker in June.

       Because Census results were delayed until Aug. 12, Democrats used population estimates from the federal American Community Survey to draw new map lines for the next decade. Democrats were under a June 30 state constitutional deadline to enact a new map or risk a process that would have given Republicans a 50-50 chance to take control of the new boundaries.

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       Since Democrats control the House, Senate and governor’s office, no Republican input was required for the maps, designed to keep them in control of the General Assembly through the decade. That was the case a decade ago.

       But Republicans, along with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, each filed federal suits shortly after Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed the map into law. Their suits allege the use of less-detailed population estimates in contrast to more defined Census counts violated voting rights guarantees.

       Republicans have alleged that there is a near 30% population variance in the Democratic-drawn House map between its most populous and least populous districts based on average population. That is beyond the 10% deviation that has been accepted by the U.S. Supreme Court.

       Republicans have asked a three-judge federal panel for a summary judgment on their lawsuit, contending the special session is an acknowledgment that the Democratic map is unconstitutional. They say there is no provision for redrawing the boundary lines and want to pick up the constitutional redistricting process which after June 30 requires a bipartisan commission, which inevitably deadlocks, requiring a ninth and partisan tie-breaking member to decide control of the map.

       Democrats have argued that the map they approved was enacted into law before the June 30 deadline and they say the state constitution is silent about enacting subsequent revisions to the new map.

       The hearings, which will have online access, begin Thursday in Chicago, with other hearings scheduled Friday in Joliet and Collinsville, Saturday in Peoria, Champaign and Carbondale and Sunday in Aurora. The complete schedule can be found here.

       Democrats redrew Illinois’ legislative map over GOP objections. Now they’re vowing to ‘make sure all voices are heard’ ahead of next week’s special remap session.

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