Utah’s Congressional maps due by Sept. 25, lawyers in redistricting case agree on new timeline

Third District Judge Dianna Gibson recently ordered new maps after she ruled that the Utah legislature violated a citizen ballot initiative setting up anti-gerrymandering criteria.

The maps must be drawn by September 25, a day later than previously ordered, after the two parties met and agreed to jointly come up with a new timeline during a status hearing on August 29.

In a new filing posted by the plaintiffs and agreed upon by both parties, pushes back the date of an evidentiary hearing to October 23 and 24 to determine whether those maps comply with Proposition 4 — the citizen-led ballot initiative that created anti-gerrymandering standards now governs Utah’s redistricting process, as ordered by Gibson.

The new timeline gives the legislature a full 30 days post the maps, 10 days to make them public as required by law, convene to vote on them, get them signed by the governor, and then be ready for that late October evidentiary hearing.

The parties also stipulated that “only existing parties to this case may file proposed maps with the Court as part of these remedial proceedings.”

The deadlines are as follows;

• Sept. 25: Maps must be made public by the Utah legislature
• Sept. 26 – Oct. 5: Public comment period
• Oct. 6: Legislature’s final vote on map and submission of map to the Court; Plaintiff’s deadline to submit any proposed map to the Court.
• Oct. 17: Parties file briefs, expert reports and other materials in support of respective map submissions and in opposition to any map submissions
• Oct. 23-24: In-person evidentiary hearing to determine whether the legislature’s maps followed Prop 4 criteria
• Oct. 28: Parties file proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law with Court
• November 10: Lt. Governor’s deadline for when maps need to be finalized

Of course, all this could be nullified if the Utah Supreme Court grants the legislature a stay on the ruling. As of this report, lawyers for the legislature have not yet filed that request, but it is expected that they will.

The proposed timeline still needs to be approved by Judge Gibson but it’s expected that she will since both sides have agreed to it.