Republican and Democratic map drawers mostly agreed on a compromise for Senate districts in Southwest Virginia. But they had some questions for the Virginia Redistricting Commission.
Saltville, a small town in Southwest Virginia that straddles two counties, illustrated a straightforward conflict of criteria for the map drawing process.
The commission is attempting to keep towns, cities, and counties together whenever possible. But map drawing is a tricky process, and deviations could have ripple effects throughout the whole commonwealth, the consultants drawing the maps and offering legal advice said.
“We're gonna have to pick our battles and I appreciate this is a good example of where there's an inconsistency,” said Commissioner Sean Kumar.
Ultimately the commission decided to keep the counties together, and split up Saltville.
“Maybe once they have their criteria in place, that could be something of a guidepost,” said J Miles Coleman, a political analyst at The University of Virginia’s Center for Politics and associate editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball. He says commissioners will have to balance criteria, and this debate is going on across the country.
“Do we focus on drawing compact districts? Do we focus on drawing potentially competitive districts? Those could be different.”
Each decision will matter. Population deviation is another criterion map drawers have had to stay from. Legally districts can deviate by 5% from a target population to guarantee equal representation, but the commission asked the consultants to stick to 2%
“Changing 10% of the population of one district to match another does have a great sort of domino effect on the rest of the map,” said Zach Coomes, from the Democratic map drawers.
More maps are coming for the next meeting on Monday.
Key Criteria about Race are still being hotly debated.
Co-Chair Greta Harris, who is normally reserved in meetings, gave an impassioned plea to commissioners to give instructions to map drawers that would preserve minority voting power in the meeting invoking her father and mother.
“She didn't get the chance to vote basic right in this Commonwealth until 1965,” she said. “My dad was born in 1919. He didn't get a chance to vote until 1965... We don't want to wait anymore.”
The commission has deadlocked on votes regarding race along partisan lines. Maps that Republicans and Democrat consultants have mostly agreed on are now coming out.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
