North Cook News

The new proposed map for Cook County's judicial subcircuits has stirred up opposition from leaders of several minority groups who've asked lawmakers to amend the boundaries included in the drawings.

Apna Ghar, an organization that helps immigrants, refugees, and survivors of gender-based violence, was one organization represented during a House and Senate Joint Redistricting Committee hearing on Dec. 16. 

"We oppose the current boundaries and we request efforts be made to amend this map and that consideration be taken of Niles Township, Asian-Americans, and the Jewish community," Radhika Sharma-Gordon, outreach and education manager at Apna Ghar, said during the hearing. 

Sharma-Gordon said the organization knows how important it is to have judges who know and understand what immigrants and refugees have gone through.

"We need judges committed to addressing the multiple language injustices that many English language learners face in seeking justice and legal remedies when they experience crimes and civil rights violations," she said.

Sharma-Gordon also stressed the need for communities, such as Niles Township, to remain in tact as a "unique community of interest."

"Apna Ghar's clients and many of our partner agencies that help to support survivors of crime and civil rights violations are located significantly in the 50th and 39th Wards, as well as in Niles Township, therefore we need to ensure that our constituencies stay strong and strongly represented in this judicial subcircuit," she added.

When subcircuits were first introduced in the 1990s, lawmakers intended to create the subcircuits in an effort to remove politics from the process and have more minorities placed on the bench, according to Illinois Periodicals Online.

A press release on CapitolFax,com noted that the latest proposed subcircuit maps were released by Democratic lawmakers on Dec. 13. 

Under the proposal, the number of Cook County's subcircuits would increase from 15 to 20, according to the release.