October 30, 2021
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'Prison gerrymandering' endures in Nevada, despite law - Yahoo News

FILE - In this July 11, 2018, file photo, a sign marks the entrance to Ely State Prison, the location of Nevada's execution chamber near Ely, Nev. Two years after banning a practice known as prison gerrymandering, Nevada will count almost half of its prison population in districts where they're incarcerated, rather than at their previous addresses. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)

CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) — Incomplete demographic information that Nevada prison officials provided lawmakers preparing to redraw the state's political maps is prompting questions and frustration two years after the Legislature passed a law to count incarcerated residents in their home communities during the once-in-a-decade redistricting process.

The data gap suggests Nevada's efforts to end so-called “prison gerrymandering” are far from complete as lawmakers prepare to implement a recently passed ban of the practice for the first time later this year.

“Here we are, in 2021, with half of the people that we aren’t being able to identify. That’s problematic to me because I would like to see everyone counted,” state Sen. Roberta Lange, a Las Vegas Democrat, said in a Wednesday hearing.

Most states count inmates as part of the population where their prisons are located. Detractors say the practice, known as “prison gerrymandering,” artificially inflates the population and voting power of rural, mostly white prison towns at the expense of minority communities disproportionately incarcerated. In Nevada, where 51% of the population is white, 58% of the prison population is Black, Latino, Native or of Asian descent.

“It’s taking people who would otherwise count for representation in their own communities and moving them to areas that aren’t just far away from home, but also look very different,” said Yurij Rudensky, redistricting counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice. “Certain areas are essentially getting a windfall because they happen to house prison facilities.”

The extent to which people in Nevada prisons are reallocated has significant implications on the population and, in turn, voting power communities across the state will have through the next decade.

Roughly 20% of the population in rural Pershing County resides in the Lovelock Correctional Center and a 2019 law requires the prison's 1,345 inmates be counted at their “last known address” when lawmakers redraw the state's political maps.

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source: https://news.yahoo.com/prison-gerrymandering-endures-nevada-despite-150800864.html

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