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JEFFERSON CITY -- Frustration over new Missouri Senate districts has blocked efforts to delay candidate filing.  Filing for this year's elections opens Tuesday, February 28th and ends March 27th.  Lawmakers have considered pushing back the filing period to buy additional time while legislative districts are finalized.

The Missouri House on Thursday voted to delay filing, but the measure did not reach a vote in the Senate.  During the debate there, several St. Louis-area republicans voiced objections to a district map approved by a bi-partisan commission early Thursday morning.

The panel worked more than 13 hours Wednesday before reaching agreement on a map to re-align Missouri's 34 Senate districts.  Doug Harpool is the chairman of the reapportionment commission.  "There's some unhappy people in both political parties, but that's what compromise is about,” says Harpool.  “And some very difficult choices were made."

The unhappy people include St. Louis County Republican Jane Cunningham, who was moved into the same district with Franklin County's Brian Nieves, a Republican.

Mid-Missouri lawmakers have few complaints.  Columbia Republican Kurt Schaefer now represents Boone and Randolph counties.  A panel of appellate court judges earlier changed that to Boone and Howard.  The citizens' commission changed it further south to Boone and Cooper.  "I'm okay,” says Schaefer.  “You know, whatever district I end up with, I'm going to represent my constituents to the best of my ability.  And I'll take whatever I get."

The judges had given Cooper County to Mike Kehoe, along with Osage and Maries Counties, in exchange for Callaway.  Now, the commission has swapped Cooper for Gasconade.  "It has a lot of great tourism aspects to it,” says Kehoe.  “Certainly, everybody's familiar with Hermann, Missouri.  I have a lot of friends down in Owensville, which is the other end of the county.  It's a long county, so it really has some unique personalities, based on where you're at in the county."

The new map has a big impact on the political plans of Callaway County Representative Jeanie Riddle.  The commission's map nearly mirrors what the judges had done, with Callaway out of Kehoe's district and placed a new Senate district to the north and east.

But the commission changed the number of that district from odd to even, which means it doesn't come up this year.  So Riddle will run again for her House seat, and not launch a Senate campaign. 

Once filed with the Secretary of State, the new Senate district map remains open for a period of fifteen days for public comment.  The reapportionment commission must then take a final vote to put it into effect.  That takes the process past the February 28th date for the opening of candidate filing.  If lawmakers do not approve a delay, constitution analysts say filing would have to open with the existing Senate districts, which, because of population shifts, violates the Federal Voting Rights act.  Thus, the issue could result in a lawsuit in federal court.

Columbia Representative Mary Still, a Democrat, announced on Thursday that she will challenge Schaefer for the Senate seat in the new Boone and Cooper County district.