Despite filing appeal, Miami says it could still settle racial gerrymandering lawsuit

By Tess Riski – The Miami Herald

On May 13, 2024

The city of Miami still thinks it could reach a settlement with voting rights activists represented by the American Civil Liberties Union in a racial gerrymandering case, despite filing an appeal late last week.

In a joint status report filed Monday, the parties said they “anticipate that the settlement will be approved” at the next City Commission meeting on May 23. At last week’s meeting, where commissioners were set to vote on a settlement agreement, Commissioner Joe Carollo led the charge to delay the vote, citing the absence of Commissioner Damian Pardo, who is a supporter of the settlement.

Under the existing settlement proposal that went before the commission last week, special elections would not be imposed, meaning the current commissioners could continue serving their terms. However, if the parties can’t reach an agreement by the next meeting, the plaintiffs are requesting to file a brief outlining the legal justification for holding special elections and an explanation of how special elections would be implemented.

On Friday, the city had informed the court that it would appeal two key rulings in the case, which voting rights activists brought against Miami in 2022. That includes a judge’s order last month that invalidated the boundaries of the city’s five districts, which U.S. District Court Judge K. Michael Moore determined the city had drawn based on the race and ethnicity of residents.

Moore cited public remarks city commissioners made in 2022, stating that the voting map was drawn to ensure the five-member commission had three Hispanic, one white and one Black commissioner to guarantee racial diversity on the board — a policy Moore said violated the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

According to Monday’s joint status report, the city believes the appeal “was necessary to preserve its appellate rights” but that it does not mean the city doesn’t intend to move forward with the settlement. The plaintiffs disagreed, saying the appeal was not necessary.

In a statement to the Miami Herald, City Attorney George Wysong said the appeal would be resolved as part of the settlement if it is approved by the City Commission and accepted by the trial court.

The parties have requested that Moore continue to pause proceedings until after the May 23 commission meeting.

Last week, the City Commission seemed poised to approve a settlement that included a new voting map with minor changes to the city’s five districts and a nearly $1.6 million payout from the city for the plaintiffs’ legal fees.

But at Thursday’s City Commission meeting, Commissioners Carollo and Manolo Reyes expressed concern over the new map, saying it’s important to ensure diversity on the commission. With Pardo out of the country, the commission voted 4-0 to defer the settlement approval to the next meeting. Carollo said Thursday that he believed the city had “an excellent chance of overturning this in an appeal.”

After that vote, Pardo told the Herald he was “disappointed” in his colleagues’ decision to defer, noting that he had been a supporter of the settlement agreement and would have voted in favor of it had he been there.

Florida ACLU Interim Executive Director Howard Simon said in a statement that “the people of Miami deserve fair redistricting maps that are not racially discriminatory.”

“That is what this case has been about from day one. … We are hopeful commissioners will approve the agreement next Thursday and end this lengthy court battle,” Simon said.

This piece was republished from Yahoo! News.