RALEIGH, N.C. — More than a dozen advocacy groups called Thursday for communities of color across North Carolina to become more involved in the process of redrawing congressional and legislative voting districts.

Lawmakers are expected to draw the new district maps next month, using updated population data from the 2020 census.

The data show people of color made up much of the state’s population growth over the past decade, and the mostly left-leaning advocacy groups said that growth should be reflected in political power under the new maps.

The groups said they want to avoid a repeat of the last redraw 10 years ago, when lawmakers crafted district maps that were repeatedly overturned by state and federal courts because of racial and overly partisan gerrymandering.

Le’Meshia Whittington, campaigns director for the North Carolina Black Alliance, said Republicans used the process unconstitutionally to give themselves an advantage that’s kept them in power for the last decade.

“When you’re so bad that your case goes all the way to the [U.S.] Supreme Court for partisan gerrymandering, which isn’t illegal, yeah, that’s an escalation and an embarrassment,” Whittington said.

“It took us 10 years of battling to come up with a sensible redistricting plan in which we could have some major impact on the political process,” civil rights attorney and North Carolina Central University law professor Irving Joyner said.

The GOP’s gains came at the expense of communities of color, which were carved up to lessen their political power, Joyner said. It’s now essential for residents in those communities to attend the public redistricting hearings being held across the state this month to let lawmakers know they don’t want that to happen again.

He added that no maps drawn by either Democrats or Republicans have ever really been fair to communities of color in North Carolina, which has resulted in less representation and fewer resources for them.