By ROBIN SHANNON
L’Observateur

VACHERIE – A group of seven St. James Parish residents has filed suit against the Parish Council to challenge the recently approved council district redraw and asked a federal court to supervise creation of a new plan.
The lawsuit, which was filed May 13 in U.S. District Court in New Orleans, claims the newly minted redistricting plan discriminates against minority voters and disenfranchises other registered voters by illegally diluting their voting strength. The suit also alleges the districts “have been obviously gerrymandered for partisan or personal political purposes.”
The plaintiffs in the case want a federal judge to declare the May 9 vote on the plan illegal and in violation of the federal voting rights act. The suit, which names all seven St. James council members as defendants, intends to block the council from forwarding the plan to the U.S. Department of Justice for review until a hearing on the case is held.
U.S. District Judge Martin L.C. Feldman is assigned to the case. Council members were issued summonses May 16, but they had not filed a response by Friday, according to court records. On Wednesday, the council met behind closed doors during an executive session at their regular council meeting to discuss the pending litigation, but no action was taken.
The plaintiffs named in the suit – Barbara Woods, Kevin Griddle, Lisa Kirklin Scott, Dianne Brathwaite, Rev. Marshall Cooper, Whitney Hickerson and Ridgely Mitchell Jr.– each reside in one of the seven council districts.
Redrawing the council boundaries in St. James, as well as in other Louisiana parishes, is required by federal law following completion of the U.S. Census every 10 years. New population figures from the 2010 census, made available earlier this year, showed a 4.2 percent increase in population since 2000 and a black majority of about 52 percent.
The total population in St. James Parish stands at 22,102.
The council had originally adopted a plan on May 4 by a vote of 4-3, with all three black council members voting against it. Parish President Dale Hymel, who said he did not think the plan would garner approval from the Justice Department, vetoed that plan the next day.
The council held a special meeting May 9, where the veto was overturned by a vote of 6-1. The council then voted 6-1 in favor of the same plan that was passed May 4. Two of the three council members, Ralph Patin and Charles Ketchens, changed their original vote, while the third, Kendrick Brass, remained in opposition.
Brass, who has been consistently opposed to the council’s new plan, had said in previous meetings the new districts would only guarantee two black council members, thus diluting the African-American vote in the parish. He said the plan creates two minority-majority council districts and one 50-50 split.
“This plan does not maintain what we have now,” Brass said. “It doesn’t allow for fair representation of the population of St. James Parish.”
Also at Wednesday’s regular council meeting, the council voted to introduce an ordinance to establish new precincts as part of the redistricting plan changing the number of precincts from 19 to 33. The council voted 6-1 in favor of issuing the ordinance, with Brass casting the only vote against.
The council will hold public hearings on the ordinance June 1 at the parish courthouse in Convent and June 15 at the courthouse annex in Vacherie.
Both hearings begin at 6:15 p.m.