A proposal has been filed in the state senate tol push the dates for candidate to file back almost a month.
Legislative and congressional districts are in a state of flux. A new bipartisan citizens committee has been named to draw new state senate districts. Other maps are facing court challenges.
Senator Mike Parson of Bolivar is pushing the filing deadline back from February 28th to March 27th. He hopes that gives any commissions time to draw new maps.
He says the date for filing to start will be only two weeks after the new senate redistricting commission holds its first meeting. And right now, candidates and potential candidates don’t know what to do because they don’t know what their districts will be. Even if the commission files a new map on the 18th, the 15-day public comment period would run the calendar past the February 28th date.
He knows there could be more challenges. Parson says filing could be pushed back into May if necessary although that would be pushing things to the limit. He says enough time has to be left to get candidates registered and to get ballots printed for the August primary.