This year’s election to select the Adams County Board of Supervisors will be a doozy in some ways and a snoozer in other ways.

The race’s qualifying deadline is March 1.

But the deadline should be moved. Voting district lines will likely change when the detailed 2010 Census data is released next month.

Election experts say the existing deadline does not provide enough time to redraw district lines and get them approved by the U.S. Justice Department — a requirement for Mississippi elections under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Not moving the deadlines could allow litigation over this year’s election, possibly resulting in more taxpayer money wasted.

More politically savvy state lawmakers seeing the potential problems ahead moved their own qualifying deadline back to June 1, for the August primary. That would seem plenty of time for both Justice Department approval of district changes and for candidates to politic.

In the end, however, federal law may already dictate the election results.

Because federal law requires district lines in Mississippi drawn to essentially guarantee black districts and white districts, candidates often appeal only to one group — whichever is dominant in their districts — and virtually ignore the others.

That court-mandated homogeneity on the surface seems good. It was certainly needed 45 years ago when the world was vastly different.

Today, however, the outdated law gives our community an excuse to remain divided — all in the name of meeting an antiquated law — and making our election process virtually the same year after year.

A change is in order.