Wisconsin's Republican legislature rushed through a redistricting plan last summer that fundamentally altered the way district maps are drawn. Instead of allowing municipalities to first draw local wards and building up from there, the legislature drew the legislative districts and told local officials to deal with it and make it fit.
The result? From the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
"We're not only changing and moving districts, we're changing the system beneath it," said Julie Glancey, the Sheboygan County clerk. "We had many, many voters who showed up (on the computer map) on the coast of Africa and we had to drag them back to the state of Wisconsin and put them where they belonged."
Wisconsin has local primaries coming up at the end of February, then statewide and national primaries in April. It's possible that voters will vote in different districts in April than they did in February. There is also a federal lawsuit pending that might result in the entire plan being scrapped due to voter disenfranchisement and extreme gerrymandering.
Add in a new, confusing and discriminatory voter ID law, and we are looking at possible mass confusion and downright anger at the polls this spring.
Republicans hired outside lawyers from the law firm of Michael Best and Friedrich to help them draw the maps last spring with almost no public input. They quickly passed the plan ahead of state Senate recall elections, fearing they might lose control of the Senate.
Going forward, voters are being entered into different districts by the physical location of their address in computerized maps. Previously, they were entered into different districts in the state voter database according to where their address fell in certain address ranges.
Local elections clerks, however, said that as part of the conversion to the new system many voters are being assigned to the wrong place on the map or not assigned at all.
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Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said she may ask for help with the work from the accountability board.
"I would think we're in the thousands of things we have to check," Nickolaus said.
Yes, even the queen of incompetence, Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus, recognizes trouble ahead.