Compactness idea proposed 6-7-11 at Dallas Redistricting Commission Meeting

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Today, 6-30-11, the final plan was presented to the Dallas Redistricting Commission for study.  Find details at http://dallasredistricting2011.blogspot.com/

************* Posts below are archived as of 6-30-11 **************

Now that the ten public input meetings throughout Dallas are over, that does not mean that public input is over.  Every Commission meeting accepts public input.

While nobody in the audience had input for the 6-7-11 City Hall meeting, one of the commissioners asked a critical question: "Could redistricting staff make a council map wherein compactness was the priority?"  Sadly this request was lost in conversations that followed (see the video), but the idea was excellent! Here is the result:

Above is a redistricting map made with population equality and compactness being the ONLY two standards used in the design. It will be presented at the next Commissioners meeting.

While this is NOT a map that can be presented as a redistricting plan, it does demonstrate the 14 "dots on the map" that represent the 14 population centers that are the same no matter who does the map. The location of these 14 locations, within each of the circles on the map, only change as the population changes. The value of this map is that it gives some idea of the locations on the map that the districts should be designed around.

While, the boundaries must  change to meet the other criteria, these 14 locations on the map are a constant, no matter who makes the map.  While the above map was not made with the certitude of a programmed calculation using detailed 2010 census data, it is very safe to say that each center of population "dot" for each district is somewhere within the larger circle placed in each district.

Here is the statistical report produced by this map.

Tuesday, 6-7-11, was a good meeting.  It produced one of the most productive ideas yet for any redistricting process that wants to minimize gerrymandering and maximize compactness in all districts. Population centers must be known, one for each district.  This is something a computer with census data could produce. It is 100% objective.  It only changes when the population changes.