Lake County Gazette

Marco Sukovic is demanding more transparency in the state's redistricting process that will determine the legislative makeup over the next 10 years. 

"What is the underlining data set that's going to be used to do the redistricting," Sukovic wrote on his Medium site April 6. "Is it going to be the U.S Census Bureau, or is it going to be some amalgamation of American Community Service (ACS) data. In my research, as it relates to the quality of U.S. Bureau data, nothing comes close to it."

Sukovic, who formerly ran for the Illinois House, said he thinks there's a good reason why so many voters seem unfazed by what's happening. 

"With reapportionment figures from the Census Bureau due in April, the DPI has pressed ahead with plans to meet the June 30 deadline without using data from the 2020 Census," Sukovic wrote. "It has argued that data from the American Community Survey and data provided by their redistricting software vendors is sufficient for purposes of redistricting. To provide cover for this overtly political power play, the Illinois Democratic House and Senate legislative caucuses are haphazardly throwing together redistricting subcommittee hearings across the state with the goal of providing a veneer of public input and participation in the process."

While Sukovic was critical of Democrats, Republicans have been pushing for their People's Independent Maps Act as a solution, which would blunt the majority party's power within the process.  

In a year where the U.S. Census Bureau has indicated the data typically used to base such decisions on will not be available before the state deadline, the measure would give the state Supreme Court the power to appoint 16 independent citizen commissioners to a redistricting commission within 30 days of passage.

"That's kind of the main thrust," Sukovic added. "The key distinction is the difference between information available at the block level, which is the Census Bureau's most unique level of capturing this information and the group level."