Don’t Let Lawmakers Draw Their Districts

clipped from www.nytimes.com Don’t Let Lawmakers Draw Their Districts By SEYMOUR P. LACHMAN In 2004, at the end of my fourth term as a New York state senator, I heard that the Senate majority leader, Joseph Bruno, wanted to talk to me. It was the beginning of the decennial state redistricting, and Mr. Bruno showed me a map of his plan for Brooklyn — which had my district cut into pieces and allocated to other senators. “We’ll give you the safest seat in Brooklyn,” he said, along with about $2 million in member items — discretionary money that senators get to dole out to constituents — considerably more than the $130,000 a year I had been receiving. All I had to do was become a Republican, or at least support him as the majority leader.