Here is Episode 9 of my never-ending redistricting series, in which I cover three states (Alabama, Arizona, and Kentucky) with little in common demographically other than all voting for John McCain.
Previous efforts:
Diary 1: Massachusetts and Texas
Diary 2: Michigan and Nevada
Diary 3: Iowa and Ohio
Diary 4: Georgia and New Jersey
Diary 5: Florida and Louisiana
Diary 6: Pennsylvania and Utah
Diary 7: Illinois and South Carolina
Diary 8: Indiana, Missouri, and Oregon
Jump below!
Note that Arizona was originally intended to share a diary with New York, but the delay in the NY-20 election has forced me to put off a final New York plan (if Tedisco wins, my NY map applies, but if Murphy pulls it out in the final count, I need a do-over).
Alabama
The overriding goals here were clear, and are regardless of which party wins the governor’s mansion in 2010. Either a Republican or Democratic Governor will contend with a legislature controlled by conservative Democrats, and so protecting Rep. Bobby Bright of Montgomery will be Priority #1 (a major flaw in my reasoning here: if Bright loses to a Republican in 2010, a very real possibility, the 2nd will be preserved more or less as-is or made more Republican to accommodate the hypothetical freshman GOPer). Anyway, I assumed Bright survives 2010 and is the big winner from redistricting. As a direct result of protecting Bright, another winner is made clear, Republican Mike Rogers of Anniston (his district was carved to elect a Democrat in 2002 and, well, that didn’t work out, so for the sake of helping Bright, Rogers will get more favorable turf).
The other districts weren’t altered much; Artur Davis’ VRA-protected 7th was made a tad less heavily African-American but should still be about 60% so, keeping it clear from controversy, and the other four seats barely change at all in partisan or racial composition.
District 1 – Jo Bonner (R-Mobile) — heavily Republican Gulf Coast districts stays mostly unchanged.
District 2 – Bobby Bright (D-Montgomery) — again, this map assumes he survives in 2010. Race tracking closely with partisan behavior in this state, the obvious tack was to boost the 2nd’s black population, so I dumped the district’s southernmost counties and anchored it in the eastern half of Alabama’s Black Belt, with the main population band stretching from Selma almost to the Georgia border, adding an arm up in Talladega.
District 3 – Mike Rogers (R-Anniston) — Rogers would now represent the only clear gerrymander in the state, and its lines are, I assure you, only as ugly as they are for a good purpose: I had to connect the heavily Republican counties northeast of Talladega with the heavily Republican counties bordering Florida’s Panhandle, so that meant creating a skinny north-south band along the Georgia line, in counties that were otherwise reserved for Bright. It’s unaesthetic, yes, but it gets the job done, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see legislative Democrats and Republicans agree on a plan like this for the mutual benefit of helping both Bright and Rogers.
District 4 – Robert Aderholt (R-Haleyville) — heavily Republican Appalachia-Tuscaloosa-exurban Birmingham mix.
District 5 – Parker Griffith (D-Huntsville) — as before, it’s socially conservative and mostly white, but with a good bench of local Democrats. Unlike Bright’s district, the 5th couldn’t be shored up much since there are no African-American areas nearby that aren’t necessary to keep the 7th VRA-protected.
District 6 – Spencer Bachus (R-Vestavia Hills) — meant to soak up every possible Republican between Birmingham and Montgomery.
District 7 – Artur Davis’ (D-Birmingham) replacement — Davis is running for Governor in 2010, but whichever Democrat succeeds him will retain a black-majority district anchored in Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, and the heavily black counties of western Alabama.
Arizona
The nonpartisan redistricting commission typically seeks to draw districts with geographical communities of interest in mind, and does little or nothing to protect incumbents. This means we shouldn’t expect a plan that explicitly shores up any of the three marginal Democratic districts (the rural 1st, suburban 5th, or mixed urban-rural 8th). While the 2001 plan created a new Hispanic-majority district for the Democrats and a competitive new rural seat (dubbed the 1st), I found that 2011’s map is due for a GOP seat in the suburban/exurban Phoenix area, based in fast-growing Pinal County. Since Arizona will be gaining two seats, the other may be of a less predictable nature, though everyone expects that it, too, will be based in metro Phoenix. My proposed 10th is a mixed Phoenix district with a considerable Hispanic population (one problem: said Hispanic pop. under my plan may be big enough to move the VRA-protected 7th out of majority-Hispanic status, which would be a non-starter).
One thing that made my numbers less-than-perfect was the lack of reliable data on Hopi Reservation population in northern Arizona (Hopi and Navajo areas are kept in separate districts due to traditional tensions between the two tribes). I used rough statistical guesstimates to separate the reservations into the 2nd and 1st, respectively. This, and my lack of certainty regarding the Hispanic percentage in Grijalva’s 7th District in this map, are the two potential demographic issues present here (and note that I used 2007 Census estimates, before 2008 numbers were available, making the data already obsolete).
All those caveats aside, I think the general spirit of Arizona’s next district map is present here:
District 1 – Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Flagstaff) — still rural with the highest Native American population in the state. Personally, as someone who is admittedly ignorant about Hopi/Navajo history, I think it unfortunate that the tribes insist on being separated, since moving the Hopi reservation into this district would put its Native population over 25% and possibly close to 30%, a clear VRA opportunity when coupled with the district’s Hispanic and other minority populations.
District 2 – Trent Franks (R-Glendale) — though it appears rural, this district is a lot more Maricopa County-heavy than one might assume.
District 3 – John Shadegg (R-Phoenix) — Republican neighborhoods of Phoenix and suburban Maricopa County keep Shadegg in the clear, for the near future at least.
District 4 – Ed Pastor (D-Phoenix) — combines the Latino neighborhoods of Phoenix to remain a strong VRA seat.
District 5 – Harry Mitchell (D-Tempe) — as before, this comprises traditionally Republican Phoenix suburbs that are trending the other way with time. In Mitchell’s current 5th, Obama garnered a respectable 47%, though I haven’t a clue how he would have fared in my 5th since my method is so low-tech and crude.
District 6 – Jeff Flake (R-Mesa) — weary though I am of this guy and his precious privileged resolutions, this 6th would stay safe for him.
District 7 – Raúl Grijalva (D-Tucson) — if the Hispanic pop. is under 50-55% in this proposed Maricopa-free iteration (and it may indeed be), then it is worth a reconfiguration, this time using 2008 stats. Regardless how accurate my map may or may not be, the commission will ensure a VRA majority-Hispanic seat for Grijalva.
District 8 – Gabrielle Giffords (D-Tucson) — now very Tucson-dominated and free of Hispanic-majority Santa Cruz County.
The new District 9 – anchored in Pinal County with significant chunks of Maricopa and Pima for a Republican-leaning suburban/exurban seat between Phoenix and Tucson.
The new District 10 – entirely within southwest Maricopa County, possibly Hispanic opportunity (but cannot dilute the Hispanic pop. in District 7, so I question whether the commission would draw something quite like this…I’m a bit more certain of the rough boundaries for a new GOP seat in District 9).
This being a commission-run redistricting process, no incumbents are deliberately protected, and only logic, geography, and racial consideration go into the process. It’s a double-edged sword, really, but makes a private citizen’s map-making simulation much simpler (no gerrymandering to help Congressman X, that is). Other than my possible trespass in District 7, I’m not aware of any probable controversy with boundaries roughly akin to these.
Kentucky
Like Alabama, the process here is likely to be split between the parties, and Democrats are assured a strong hand by holding both the governor’s mansion and the House. Even if redistricting is delayed after the 2011 elections and a Republican is elected Governor, the Democratic House majority seems too large to overcome in a couple cycles, making it likely that Rep. Ben Chandler (D-Versailles) will be protected (and that, of course, assumes he doesn’t run for another office in 2010 or 2011). Making Chandler’s 6th a tad more Democratic for future insurance was the only clear priority of this map, which otherwise leaves lines mostly unaltered.
District 1 – Ed Whitfield (R-Hopkinsville) — expands in area due to lagging population growth, but remains strongly Republican and mostly rural or “small town”.
District 2 – Brett Guthrie (R-Bowling Green) — changes only minimally, remains GOP-friendly with several pockets of urban population and (somewhat outnumbered) Democratic votes.
District 3 – John Yarmuth (D-Louisville) — comprises 99.7% of Jefferson County, and that’s it. Talk about simple!
District 4 – Geoff Davis (R-Hebron) — looks virtually identical to its prior incarnation as an Ohio River-based, heavily GOP district.
District 5 – Hal Rogers (R-Somerset) — heavily rural and Republican, possibly the most socially conservative seat in Kentucky, but drops some traditionally Dem areas for the 6th’s benefit, picking up the slack elsewhere.
District 6 – Ben Chandler (D-Versailles) — McCain won Chandler’s current 6th 55-43 but the incumbent is very popular and is likely unbeatable. Still, he has long held statewide ambitions, and one of these days he will vacate for bigger things, making it a priority for House Democrats and the Governor to shore up the 6th for a future Democratic candidate. Thus, an equestrian-heavy Central Kentucky seat is reconfigured as a Frankfort-Lexington-coal mines district with stronger Dem history. McCain may still have won here, but not with more than 51-53%, making it that much easier for a future Dem to win.
Other states I hope to cover soon include: Colorado, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and West Virginia. There are some key states (among them, California, Minnesota, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin) that could or will require two maps each based on different hypothetical outcomes regarding seat distribution or partisan control. It isn’t clear what the seat count will be in California, North Carolina, or Washington, and in the other four states, partisan control of redistricting is utterly up in the air between now and after the 2010 elections. So most likely, these states will be those that I cover last.
Is your new 9th District meant to favor a Democrat? Since Arizona is done by and Independent commission, I’m guessing they would do one Repub and one Dem, right?
Rogers will lose the next election and Bobby will win the next election. Then we’re looking at how the 3rd can take dems out of 4 and 6 and possibly 2. And we’re looking at how the 2nd can take dems from 1. But even if Rogers is there, the dems will look at how to create 4 dem districts and 3 R districts. Also, it depends a lot on what the state reps and senators who want to be in congress think about this. That’s why the map is the way it is now, or else the 3rd would be more democratic than it is. A state senator in south alabama wanted to run in the 2nd as a dem, but ultimately didn’t.
Is there a reason why KY-01 has a skinny part. Whoever campaigns in KY-01 will have to do a lot of driving. It might make sense to trade some of eastern KY-01 or some western KY-02.
Not too shabby, but a few things you need to consider.
First of all, the rules of the commision stipulate that they need to consider “Communities of Interest” over pretty much everything else (including things like fairness). You did a pretty good job with that all things consider.
The Yuma area is, frankly, pretty damn segregated. I could see them drawing some of the white areas (north Yuma, Fortuna Foothills, etc) into Franks district. This will help make sure that Grijalva doesn’t end up underwater VRA-wise.
I can’t really see them drawing the north Tucson suburbs into a district with Pinal county. If anything, Gabby’s going to be getting some chunks of southern Pinal County tied to Tucson (Saddlebrook, Red Rock, etc). What strikes me as more likely is that they put northern Cochise county into Kirkpatrick’s district. At the end of the day, it has a lot more in common with the southern parts of Kirkpatrick’s current district than Tucson, and she should do better there than Giffords ever did anyway . Gabby can keep Sierra Vista and the border towns, where she has more appeal.
Now I’m just getting nit-picky, but eastern Santa Cruz county is heavily White and makes sense in the 8th, so no real reason to take it out. It’s really just a few thousand people, though.
I doubt they’ll draw a new 9th into that particular part of Maricopa County; it’s heavily Hispanic for one. Doesn’t make much sense; keep that with the new 10th (which looks a little small). Instead, draw it into the East Valley (your new 6th is too big anyway, it probably has at least ~900K people just right now), maybe creating a Chandler-Gilbert-Pinal County seat?
Your 10th is pretty good, would just need to be smoothed out with the 2nd, the 3rd, and the 4th a little better. It would probably be somewhat competitive as well. I’m seeing a ~30% Hispanic interest community there. They probably won’t make a new VRA district unless they’re ordered to, and in that case, look for things to get messy.
Good work there, I had no idea how we were gonna keep Chandler’s seat safe.
The counties in the far eastern part of the 1st district helped elect Whitfield in 1994. They are extremely GOP Southern Kentucky Mountain counties. If the Democrats could get control of the process, they should cut out the eastern counties and give them to the 2nd district and take Owensboro into the 1st district. It is very strongly Democratic at the local level and could give Democrats a shot at the 1st district once Whitfield retires. Democrats tried this in 2002 but the GOP Senate stopped them.
Also, consider adding Democratic-leaning Nelson County (Bardstown) to the 6th District.
So we’re looking at likely both new Arizona seats being republican seats? That sucks.
This is exactly we need to milk states like California and Illinois for as many democratic seats as possible.
These maps are extremely uncreative and are just slightly adjusted from the current maps…
Analysis based on current maps and not those proposed above.
AZ- Well, this map can be excused because of the inevitable non-partisan redistricting. I don’t expect any dramatic increases that can be gained for Dems through creative districting anyway.
I hope a new district will be an even fight district in the Phoenix area. I’d also like to see the Hopi reservation combined into the first as I don’t think that there’s really any reason to continue to keep it excluded at this point.
KY-
KY-01 Toss-up Rep. Ed Whitfield
Add Daviess and Hancock counties to include Owensboro into the district. Remove Ohio and Butler counties in the Northeast and lop of the Eastern extension, excluding as many of the counties east of Trigg along the Tennessee border as possible population-wise.
KY-03 Likely Democrat Rep. Yarmouth
Jefferson County only
KY-02 Solidly GOP Reps. Hal Rogers/Brett Guthrie
Combine all the counties excluded from the first with much of the current 2nd to include Warren Co. (Bowling Green) and the Western, insanely GOP portions of District 5 up to at least Whitley, Laurel & Jackson. Exclude the parts of Jefferson County and the immediate counties surrounding Jefferson County as well as Hardin & Meade. Also, the 2nd would absorb GOP-leaning Garrard and all of Lincoln from KY-06.
KY-06 Toss-up Rep. Ben Chandler (but strong Dem with inc)
The district would shift slightly West, picking up Marion, Washington, and much of Nelson from the 2nd and shedding some of the Western counties including Bourbon, Clark, Estill and, possibly, parts of Madison. The district would shift a bit towards Democrats.
KY-04 Solid GOP Rep. Geoff Davis
The district would absorb Meade, Hardin and the counties surrounding Jefferson from KY-02 and would include as many of the current Northern KY counties as necessary to snake up into Boone, Kenton and Campbell.
KY-05 Lean Democrat (OPEN SEAT)
Sweeping from Bell County up through the current 5th into much of the 4th district to include counties up to at least Pendleton and Harrison but more from the 4th if necessary. BBourbon, Estill, Clark, and Madison, if necessary, would be added from the sixth district.
AL
I don’t have time to go into my proposal in detail, but there are a lot of wasted Dem (read: black votes) in Mobile county that can be fairly easily gerrymandered into another district.
Thanks for the great work, once again. Can you shoot me an email when you have a chance? davidnyc
atswingstateproject [dot] com.When you get to Colorado, can you give me a buzz? My e-mail is mneil at du dot edu.
Looks like district one now encompasses the Big Mountain resistors who are Navajos opposed to Relocation. The are also encompasses places where the Navajo Nation use to have jurisdiction before it was partitioned to the Hopis via PL 93-531 as ordered by the Healing v. Jones decision. Maybe the parents of relocated Navajos and Hopis now want housing for their kids. The people were moved from there reservation into foreign lands and dumped. The Navajo Nation does not want them back.
The 1882 reservation says the minerals belong to the Hopi and other Indians(Individual Navajos not Navajo government or Window Rocks) settled there by the Secretary of Interior.
1903-1911 Matthew Murphy prepares allotments to those Hopis and Indians(individual Navajos) that want to settle on Hopiland. Project cancelled at last minute.
1946 Felix Cohen says mineral rights belong to Individual Hopi and Navajo not governments.
1956 H. Rex Lee, Paul Jones, Boyden, Littell conspire congressional legislation to take individual rights of Navajo and Hopi to nationalize the Black Mesa Coal Resources.
1958 72 Stat. 403, PL 85-547 Determine Rights and Interest in Moqui. Congressional legislation to Nationalize Black Mesa coal fields authorizing a 3-judge panel to determine who owns the mineral rights to the Black Mesa coal. Goldwater admits there are legal problems. Office Management and Budget admits legal problems, but gives approval.
1958 Healing v. Jones lawsuit false start. Judge Ling pulls out claiming he had other commitments. Judge Ling order General Holdridge to have mental compentency test for defending Navajo and Hopi rights. Goldwater wants Holdridge locked up for interfering with Navajo and Hopi governments.
1959 Healing v. Jones restarted with Judge Yankowich. Opinion given that 300 unknown Navajos on Matthew Murphy list can stay as it indicates willingness to settle. Congress must partition land. Black Mesa Coal on Hopiland now goes to Navajo Tribe as beneficiary.
1963 Healing v. Jones. 373 US 75 US Supreme Court Opinion
PER CURIAM.(very short opinion)
The motion to substitute Raymond Nakai in the place of Paul Jones as the party appellant in No. 985 and as a party ap-pellee in No. 1050 is granted. The motion to substitute Abbott Sekaquaptewa in the place of Dewey Healing as a party appellee in No. 985 and as a party appellant in No. 1050 is granted. The motion to affirm in No. 985 is granted and the judgment which is common to both cases is affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS is of the opinion that probable jurisdiction should be noted and would decide the cases only after argument.
1974 PL 93-531 Land partitioned. Navajos and Hopis living on wrong side must move. 300 unknown are also moved illegally.
2004 Unofficial Mathew Murphy allotments found in National Archives showing there are 834 Navajos that are known by Township, range and Section. No summons issued to Navajos as part of rule 4 of Federal Rules of Civil procedure.
Possible political deal to end the Navajo Hopi Land dispute.
The Kayenta Mine provides coal which powers the pumps to carry Colorado River water over the Buckskin Mountains to Phoenix and Tucson. Black Mesa Mine provided power to the now closed Mohave Generating Station. Mohave provided power to Southern California, Nevada, and Arizona.
The redistricting is to legislate a settlement so the Navajo and Hopi governments can keep their money so Phoenix and Tucson can have water so it can prove it has need for the water at the expense of the Navajos and Hopis who live there especially those that owned the coal and mineral rights. Killing the owners by moving them off to die slowly is still criminal. This is Arizona’s black eye.
A VRA district wouldn’t help the Hopi. They vote Republican.
Also, the Hopi area you put into District 2 is too big geographically, but that’s not a huge problem — that can be worked out by the powers that be.
The Republicans don’t gain anything by making Chandler’s district more Dem-friendly. Actually, they have a strong interest in leaving the district the way it is so that they can have the upper hand when Chandler inevitably runs for higher office.