Ever since Rep. Maurice Hinchey’s announcement last week that he will not seek re-election this fall, the conventional wisdom has been that his district, NY-22, will likely be obliterated when LATFOR turns its attention to redrawing the House lines.

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Hinchey’s district, which stretches from the Hudson Valley through the Southern Tier to Ithaca, was gerrymandered specifically to protect a Democrat. Nevertheless, Hinchey had a tough go of it in 2010 when the Republicans pretty much threw everything they had at him. He was re-elected, but emerged from the fight with his GOP challenger George Phillips, who was making his second attempt to unseat the cognressman, fairly bruised. (Admittedly, some of those wounds were self-inflicted).

Before Hinchey’s retirement announcement, it looked like two freshmen Central New York Republicans – Ann Marie Buerkle and Richard Hanna – would likely end up in a primary battle when state lawmakers finished redrawing the House lines and removing two seats – a move made necessary by New York’s slow population growth as compared to other states.

But Hinchey’s departure has changed the calculus. LATFOR Co-Chairs Jack McEneny and Mike Nozzolio both told me on CapTon last night that they will immediately be returning to work on the House lines after releasing the Senate and Assembly lines last week, and should have a finished product sometime in mid-February.

In the meantime, the two Republicans who had already announced their intention to challenge Hinchey – Phillips and Tom Engel, a NYC attorney and part-time Ulster County resident – are in limbo until LATFOR figures out its next move.

In recognition of that, Engel sent out this email message last night to some 20,000 Republican and Conservative activists. It is notably NOT a fundraising appeal, but rather a just-in-case organizing tool so Engel can, as he puts it, “be ready to take on whomever and whatever the Democrats have to throw at us.”

“At this point…it is not appropriate, I feel, to ask for additional investment in my campaign – at least until we know for certain what form the district will take,” wrote Engel, who said he has already “inevsted six figures of my own money” into the campaign.

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