SALEM — An Oregon group has decided to table until 2028 its proposed ballot measure to empower an independent commission instead of elected politicians to redraw boundaries of the state’s congressional and legislative districts. The group cited a drawn-out legal challenge from labor unions and a lack of financial support as primary reasons for the delay.

Leaders of People Not Politicians, the group behind the proposed measure, decided to pause the campaign due to a lack of funding for advertising and signature gathering, its leaders said. As of April 2 the group had collected less than half of the 156,231 signatures required to get the measure on this year’s ballot, according to the executive director, Norman Turrill.

The group also was stymied by a multi-year legal challenge from Our Oregon, an advocacy group primarily funded by state public employee unions that successfully stalled a similar proposal in 2022. The lengthy litigation process likely deterred many potential donors, said Dan Meek, leader of good government group Honest Elections and attorney for People Not Politicians.

Last week, the state Court of Appeals ruled in favor of People Not Politicians, allowing them to continue gathering signatures. But the damage has been done, according to Turrill. It’s too late to make a funding push for this year’s ballot, he said. Still, the group has not given up.

“We intend to file it again, this time for the 2028 election,” Turrill said. The process might attract more donors then, he said, because “it’ll be nearer the (2030) census and the redistricting process” that by law will take place in 2031.

Following every national census count, taken in years ending in zero, states must redraw congressional and legislative district boundaries to ensure districts are nearly equal in population.

Similar to many other states, Oregon allows lawmakers to decide changes to district boundaries, last redrawn in 2021. Good government groups have long advocated for an independent redistricting commission, arguing that Democrats as the legislative majority in 2021 redrew congressional districts in a way that gave them an unfair advantage, known as gerrymandering.

Critics said state lawmakers of both parties similarly conspired that year to protect most incumbent legislators in the way they created new state House and Senate maps.

Spokespeople for top Oregon Democrats, including Senate President Rob Wagner and House Speaker Julie Fahey, said they would not comment on allegations of politically minded line-drawing.

The Princeton Gerrymandering Project rated Oregon’s congressional district boundaries among the most skewed in the country in favor of incumbents and Democrats. In 2021, researchers gave Oregon’s new district maps an overall “F” rating for fairness and competitiveness, due to the advantage that Democrats maintained.

That year, Republican lawmakers legally challenged the maps that Democrats proposed for legislative and congressional districts, arguing that they were drawn to favor Democrats. The Oregon Supreme Court rejected their challenge of the legislative districts, while a special judicial panel rejected the challenge of the congressional map.

In an attempt to make the state’s electoral district boundaries more fair, People Not Politicians submitted a ballot measure proposal in 2022 to create an independent 12-person commission in 2024 to head the redistricting process.

The committee would have included four Republicans, four Democrats and four independent or third-party members. The proposed measure would also have required the commission to redraw the district boundaries in 2025.

The idea is not novel. Although many legislatures nationwide oversee their state’s redistricting process, several states, including California and Washington, have so-called independent commissions that oversee the process. Many of those commissions, however, are not truly independent, experts say. For example, in Washington, a five-person commission is in charge of redrawing the electoral district maps but must present the maps to the Legislature for final approval.

Oregon advocates based their ballot proposal on more truly independent redistricting commissions in Arizona and California. Similar to California’s system, the proposed measure would have disqualified many politically affiliated people from participating on the commission and used a lottery system to narrow down the list of potential commission members.

But the effort immediately met a legal challenge from Our Oregon, the union-backed nonprofit. Our Oregon argued that the proposed measure would require multiple amendments to the Oregon Constitution and therefore could not be decided by a single ballot measure. That case, which originated in the Marion County Circuit Court, landed at the state Court of Appeals, which last week ruled in favor of People Not Politicians.

Our Oregon had previously challenged a nearly-identical proposal aimed for the 2022 ballot. That year, Our Oregon argued that the ballot title did not clearly convey that the measure would replace the current electoral district maps. The Oregon Supreme Court ruled in favor of Our Oregon, which delayed signature gathering efforts for months, Turrill said.

“Our Oregon has been challenging this every place they could,” Turrill said.

Michele Ruffin, executive director of Our Oregon, did not respond to written questions from The Oregonian/OregonLive.

Though the Appeals Court decision means that People Not Politicians can continue collecting signatures for this year’s ballot, Turrill said there’s not enough money to do so.

The political action committee affiliated with People Not Politicians reported $1,550 in contributions in 2023 and ended the year with $13,754 on hand, state campaign finance filings show.

Turrill said the group did not receive enough contributions to fund its campaign or pay for signature gatherers. He said many organizations that have historically supported the effort, such as statewide business lobbying group Oregon Business & Industry, did not financially support the campaign.

Preston Mann, director of political affairs for Oregon Business & Industry, said the group has long supported proposals for an independent redistricting commission and would support a future initiative. Mann did not answer a question asking if the business lobbying group supported People Not Politicians’ proposed measure.

“We evaluate initiative petitions on an election-cycle-to-election-cycle basis but certainly hope to see meaningful reform prior to the next regularly scheduled redistricting period,” Mann said in an email.

Turrill said he is optimistic about the People Not Politicians campaign’s chances in 2028 because legal challenges will not be an issue and the redistricting process that will begin in 2030 will be imminent.

“That will give us enough time” to collect signatures, Turrill said, “and it will be maybe more interesting to funders.”