The U.S. Census Bureau released its latest numbers this morning, confirming that Washington state is in line to gain a tenth congressional district, starting in 2012.
That’ll be fun. Not only will this create a brand new open seat, likely in a swingy district carved out of Southwest Washington, it will also squeeze the boundaries of the other seven western districts, possibly shifting the red-blue balance here and there.
Unlike most other states, Washington’s got a relatively reasonable redistricting process, led by a bipartisan commission and a fairly strict set of guidelines, so we won’t get the sort of blatantly partisan gerrymandering we’ll surely see elsewhere. That said, it was heartening to see the Senate Dems recently select former Mayor Nickels henchman Tim Ceis as their representative on the commission. Whatever you think about Ceis, he’s about as Machiavellian as they come around these parts, so it’s good to see him part of the mix.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering, Washington’s population grew 14.1 percent over the past decade, to 6,724,540… well off the blistering 21 percent growth rate between 1990 and 2000.
The Denny Heck Seat?
Yet we’re still largely irrelevant when it comes to choosing each party’s Presidential candidates and/or electing Presidents . . . Anyone else think we should move our primary to the same day as New Hampshires, party rules be damned?
I mean, it’s not like they can really make us less relevant than we already are.
With the likely changes to the 8th District, it’ll probably be a good time for Dave Reichert to ride off into the sunset.
Hmm… I wonder if we can turn the 8th or 9th into purely urban districts.
The redistricting commission should be non partisan, not bi-partisan. There are a lot of us in the state who don’t belong to either party, or maybe I should say who don’t belong to either wing of the one party.
How’s that non-partisan King County Council working out for you? Is it all non-partisanny? In this day and age, non-partisan just means you don’t put a (D) or (R) next to a name, it doesn’t mean the people aren’t Dems or Reps. Until a viable third party develops, those that don’t belong to one of the two established parties will be on the outside looking in.
libertarian @ 5
Agreed. Nonpartisan redistricting is the correct answer.
British Columbia’s Citizen’s Assembly on Election Reform recommended that citizens performed the redistricting, with an emphasis on maximizing competitiveness (fewer “safe seats”). The citizen commission would be like jury duty.
It’s very similar to the ideal of government regulated open markets. People set the rules and businesses fight it out. You need some checks and balances to counteract the inevitable regulatory capture.
(I haven’t paid attention, so don’t know the status of all their proposed reforms. For instance, I know that PR-STV was gutted by the incumbents.)
What’s the goal of non partisan redistricting? What would their guiding principle be?
It seemed like non-partisan King County Council was just a way for Republicans for not having to put an R by their name.
Hi Blue.
The citizen’s goal is to maximize competitiveness, the incumbent’s goal is to divide up the pie.
In Washington the redistricting commission is made up of people appointed by the Republican and Democratic legislative caucuses. In Iowa, which has been reported to have the best system, the redistricting is done by the non partisan legislative staff, or some such group.
If it was me the redistricting would be done by professors from the colleges and university, both public and private, math dept in the state.
@10 Naw, can’t use the colleges and universities, those are the HOMES of the liberal elitists and their fancy book learnin with all their math and science (devils work). Naw, we need a bunch of radical evangelicals who let “god” tell them in their dreams how to draw the districts. That seems only “fair”.
(sarcasm)
@5 It’s a partisan world, my friend.
libertarian @ 10
Been chewing on what you said.
Redistricting software is now used. Just like spreadsheets are used by financial accountants to play “what if”. So the math part is already done.
The hard part is the judgement.
A citizen’s commission, with the charter to maximize competitiveness, is a pretty good idea.
PS- Thanks for the Iowa tip. I’ll look it up.
@ 12. Yeh I am right and they are wrong ;)
re 5: That’s exactly what we need! Someone who is so fuzzled, they can’t even decide which party to join.
Although, if the past is any predictor of the future, most ‘independents’ lean right — which makes them stealth Republicans.
Independents are the ultimate lying machine — outdoing their Republican henchmen 10 to 1.
I’d like to actually see judgment removed from the process as much as possible. What we need is a neutral set of heuristics, some simple algorithm for creating districts.
Here’s what I’d do:
1. See if it would be possible to make census areas more uniform in size and shape.
2. Build districts around large urban areas, starting with the largest city, then adding other census areas in the same county as that city in order of largest to smallest currently adjacent area until you have a full district.
3. When you have added all census areas in a county, start adding from the county with the largest currently adjacent census district. In rural parts of states you’ll add several full counties.
4. Have an exception that you can’t add territory if it will make a non-contiguous district.
5. After finishing the district built around the largest city, start with the next largest and follow the procedure until you have a full 10 districts with equal population.
You could do all this with a simple computer (say, a smart phone running an app), with a citizens panel appointed to resolve unforeseen problems with the heuristic. The panel would meet after the automated district formation was done, mere seconds after the official census data was complete.
how would non partisans handle…
Gay Marriage?
Net neutrality?
Progressive Income taxes?
Separation of church and state?
Continuing the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan?
Extending unemployment benefits for the 99ers
Wall street reform?
Mortgage reform?
National Debt?
Closing public parks for lack of funds?
Increased Traffic Cameras?
Gitmo?
The national debt?
Funding Social Security?
What’s the non partisan solution to those hard issues?
The best redistricting we ever had was in 1972 under Federal court order. Judge appointed prof. Richard Morrill of the UW Geography Dept. as his Redistricting Master. Morrill’s students drew up a plan intended to maximize the number of swing districts, and they totally disregarded where incumbents actually lived. Both parties had to field candidates everywhere, and they had to work to get elected or re-elected.
Worked pretty well; Democratic candidates were preferred by a majority of voters in the 1972 election and Dems won majorities in both houses of the Legislature.
Ignoring incumbents’ home addresses prevented some of the tortured boundaries we see today, where both parties begin first of all to protect their incumbents. It just meant that some incumbents, such as the 46th District’s Paul Kraabel, had to move a mile or so to keep up with their district.
There’s a lot to be said for non-partisan redistricting, in preference to bi-partisan redistricting.
Jason – The BC Citizens Assembly was a great attempt at redesigning an election system to be more non-partisan. It’s an interesting idea to adapt it to redistricting the state but I think it would be too late for this time out. Maybe next Census?
Frankly though I would like to see Washington adopt the Citizens Assembly model to redesign our statewide elections.
The target population for Legislative Districts will be 137,236. If we use the state’s most recent estimates of population by LD (note: Excel), we can estimate how much adjustment will have to be made in those boundaries. BTW, the state’s estimate of 6,733,250 was 0.13% higher than the Census number.
By my calculations, six LDs will lose 10% or more of their current population. The most shrinkage will be in the 2nd, which is almost 21% above its target. The others in the way-too-big group are the 18th, 5th, 44th, 16th, and 17th. Only one of them (the 5th) is in King County. The 2nd is in Pierce, 44th in Snohomish, 16th around Walla Walla, 18th and 18th near Vancouver.
There’s only one LD that’s more than 10% under its target — downtown Spokane’s 3rd LD. The 33rd, in southern King County, will have to add a bit over 9%. and four more Democratic LDs (the 32nd, 19th, 28th, and 46th) are between 8 and 9 percent under the target.
As for the other King County LDs, the 11th, 30th, 34th, 36th, 37th, 43rd, and 48th will have to grow a bit, whereas the 31st, 41st, 45th, and 47th need to shrink.
Hi N @ 20
Do you have any of the redistricting tools to play with?
It’d be fun, instructive to go through the exercise.
Show plans that max for Dems, GOP, competitiveness.
Then we can detect how much our party screwed us through “bipartisan cooperation” (aka capitulation).
I don’t, Jason. I’ve been doing this stuff with spreadsheets.
But I’d love to start tinkering with some. What are they, and where can I find them?
If the Seattle LDs all need to grow, I think that implies that the city may lose one of its districts (or at least a partial LD). My guess is that the small piece of the 11th that’s now in Seattle may be switched to the 37th.
What I’d really find amusing — it won’t happen — would be for Mercer Island to be switched to the 37th (after all, the 41st is too big and the 37th is too small). If it gulped up the whole island, the 34th and 43rd could take some of its edges to gain population. And so on and so forth…
Won’t really matter much, in a few years when our debt makes us the next greece, people will be moving like flys.
Why don’t you get a head start?
For redistricting fun, check out Dave’s Redistricting App – http://www.gardow.com/davebrad.....chapp.html. This is a application where you color in the lines (by precinct for Washington). You can test out Cascadia’s theory of how to draw districts, or you can try to create a 10-0 map for Democrats (or Republicans, for that matter).
Over at Swing State Project, there are quite a few user diaries using the application – for most of the states including Washington.
Independents leaning Republican is a fairly recent phenomenon. Leaning either way is often an outgrowth of whichever party is out of public favor enough that some people don’t want to publicly identify with it even though they will usually vote that ticket.
Also, we have a large segment of low-information and sort of fuzzy-thinking voters who really don’t have a clear idea what they think politically and are swayed by factors other than policy positions or party ideology–things like hot-button issues, haircuts, whoever has the most potent propaganda, etc. If any of you saw the Rachel Maddow segment where she intervewed Joe Miller supporters in Alaska you saw an example of that.
In other news, Greece is not an example that has much if any relevance to the US’s position. we’re the largest economy in the world, and investors flock to buy or debt because they beleive that we will continue to prosper. Greece is propped up by the EU and is dependent on their monetary policy. I you think we’re Greece, you don’t think much of the US. Why do you hate America?
Love @ 26
I respectfully disagree.
We have large segments of both misinformation and apathetic voters. Largely due to continuous media of hate and fear.
As Marshal McLuhan has taught us, people shut down when they’re overstimulated.
The corporatist investment in propaganda is quite effective.
KC @ 25
Sweet links. Thanks!