While the chaos rages in the Middle East, another type of storm is brewing in Louisiana – namely, the redistricting of almost every elected office in Louisiana. You might even call it the Super Bowl of politics because the winner of the predictable tug-of-war will be declared the champion for the next ten years until the process must be repeated all over again.

This year, the state Legislature and local jurisdictions will be redrawing political districts ahead of the fall elections. Almost every position, from congressmen to state representatives to locally elected councilmembers will see their respective districts grow, shrink, or in some cases vanish.

The headline making tug-of-war will take place over which congressman will lose his seat. Louisiana must lose a congressional seat due to the matrix that determines the numbers of congressmen a state is allowed to send to Washington. However, it’s not as easy as plugging the numbers into a computer, and it spits out a nice clean map that everyone loves and supports. The map of districts must include a minority district.

This seat was and probably will be headquartered in New Orleans. Therefore, Congressman Cedric Richmond is safe.

Then we have to factor in the seniority of the members of the delegation and the weight they hold on where the lines are drawn for the other districts. In this case, Congressman Rodney Alexander holds considerable weight and will have a looming influence on the allocation of congressional districts.

The dilemma is that no matter how you draw the lines, there will be two current congressmen in the same congressional district who will be forced to run against each other if one doesn’t bow out gracefully. The easiest district to “eliminate” is the Third Congressional District held by Congressman Jeff Landry since he is the newest member of the Louisiana delegation.

If Landry’s district is carved up, St. Bernard and Plaquemines are likely to get lumped into District 1, held by Congressman Scalise. Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes are likely to be split with Terrebonne and the River Parishes going to the New Orleans District and Lafourche going either to the Baton Rouge District or the Lafayette-Lake Charles district. This leaves the western portion of the district – the home of sitting Congressman Landry. If the western portion of the Third District is shoved into the Southwest district held by Congressmen Boustany, the two are likely to face each other in a tightly contested race as early as next year. The population bases of the new district will be split between Lake Charles and Lafayette, making for an interesting battle between two members of the same party.

Stay tuned because we’re just in the pre-game show of this (political) super bowl.

The last bite…

Happy (Vietnamese) New Year! Friday night, I went to the Mary, Queen of Vietnam Tet Festival in New Orleans East and feasted on every dish imaginable. Rolls, fired bananas, pho and more rolls. It was cold outside so the pho (Vietnamese soup) hit the spot. I was seated with Ann Duplessis, deputy mayor of New Orleans, and the food just kept coming. The music was great, the food was hot, and the flavors were out of this (Western) world!  I give it 4.5 crumbs! (out of 5)

Buddy Boe, a resident of LaPlace, is a former parish administrator and is well known on the local political (and food) scenes. His column appears every Wednesday in L’Observateur.