HARRISBURG - Candidates are already announcing that they are running for newly redrawn state legislative districts, but that didn't prevent the state Supreme Court from hearing arguments Monday about whether the reapportionment plan passes constitutional muster.
The state's highest court heard arguments from both sides on appeals of the plan adopted last month by the Legislative Reapportionment Commission, which sets new boundaries for House and Senate seats for the coming decade to reflect population shifts.
The issues before the court range from an alternative statewide plan offered by 13 voters to reduce the number of municipalities split between districts to a challenge by Democratic senators over which Senate district is being moved from western Pennsylvania to fast-growing Monroe County.
The court has a narrow window to act on the appeals. The period starts today for candidates to circulate nominating petitions to run in the April 24 primary election.
All seven justices were present with Justice Joan Orie Melvin formally rejecting calls that she recuse herself from the proceedings. Pennsylvanians for Modern Courts, a judicial reform advocacy group, called on Melvin to step down from the court at least temporarily due to published reports that she is the target of a grand jury investigation in Allegheny County into use of state workers in political campaigns.
The justices asked pointed questions of attorneys about the process, but gave little indication of whether they will uphold the plan or send it back to the commission for rewrites. Chief Justice Ronald Castille said the plan has a problem with a few districts not having all precincts contiguous or connected.
"We will try to decide this with all due haste given the political calendar," said Castille at the hearing's end.
Attorney Clifford Levine , representing the Senate Democratic caucus, asked the court to freeze the current districts in place for two years while a plan is drawn up that splits fewer counties among senatorial districts. The caucus has asked that the 47th Senate District represented by Republican Elder Vogel be moved to Monroe County rather than 45th District represented by Democrat James Brewster.
The voters offering an alternate plan argued that the commission's plan violates a constitutional requirement not to split municipalities "unless absolutely necessary."
"With each split, the voice of the subdivision, the community it represents, is diluted and dimmed," said their attorney, Virginia Gibson.
The commission plan meets the overriding requirement of having equal population among districts, said Commission Counsel Joseph A. Del Sole.
During 40 years under the current system, a Supreme Court has yet to overturn a reapportionment plan, said Terry Madonna, a pollster at Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, who has written about reapportionment.
"The court has one job - to be sure the plan does not violate constitutional principles," Madonna said. "The court can't substitute its judgment of what is a better plan."