Can someone explain how are district lines drawn?

[srican69]

Should this be done by a bipartisan panel or atleast in way that ensures no particular side has an advantage?

Think of it .. if one side redraws the lines completely to their advantage - that ensures that they will stay in power. This is inherently undemocratic.

[legcramp]

1. For which state?

EOM

[leveymg]

2. Most places, bipartisan committees are appointed by Govs out of the State Legislatures.

Since the GOP concentrates on such state-level positions, and holds most of them in many states, they control the process, overall.

[SheilaT]

3. It depends on the state.

About thirty years ago I took a geography class of some kind, and one of our little projects was to draw new Congressional districts for some state, not our own. It was surprisingly tricky to make it so that they were of reasonably equal population than you'd think. And I don't recall that we even had information on voter registrations, meaning we couldn't even play with making districts more one party than the other.

I've long thought that all redistricting should be done this way. Maybe start completely from scratch. Give the task to people who have no idea what the original districts look like. Don't let them know anything about voter registrations. See what they come up with.

It could work.

[truebluegreen]

5. California did an excellent, non-partisan job last time around

by using a citizens' commission instead of one made up of politicians. Go figure.

[krispos42]

9. They should be done with no more than six lines...

...each line being either the shortest distance between two points, or a segment of a state or international boundary, or a water course.

That would keep the districts from being all convuluted and horseshoe-shaped, I would thing.

You could follow a river or lake as one "line" of the district border, I but I think it would be damn hard to gerrymander things.

[Retrograde]

11. The districts are supposed to all have roughly the same population

which is what makes it more challenging. California, for example, has some huge Congressional districts that cover the rural areas, while Los Angeles has a few of its own.

[krispos42]

13. Squares only have 4 lines.

In cities, I would expect a lot of square districts that overlap the main streets.

I looked at NYC's districts; a lot of them are pretty regular in shape, so gerrymandering probably isn't much of a problem.



But you get the idea. Following the coastline is one "line", in my system, so in a lot of these districts they would have 5 more lines to round things out.

[Benton D Struckcheon]

15. There's still gerrymandering in that map.

The 14th is Eliot Engel's district. No way he should be representing people in Queens. That district should be entirely in the Bronx.
The 8th looks pretty weird too, but I don't know anything about Brooklyn. Don't speak it, far as I know don't have a valid visa to go there.

[Mnemosyne]

4. Gerrymandering on steroids. nt

[grantcart]

6. AZ system is great

AZ has about the best system, it is independent and enshrined in the constitution. Here are the criteria:

The six criteria the commission attempts to satisfy, in descending order of importance, are:
1.that they are in compliance with the U.S. Constitution and the Voting Rights Act,
2.that districts are roughly equal in population,
3.that they appear compact and contiguous,
4.that they respect communities of interest,
5.that they incorporate visible geographic features; city, town, and county boundaries; and undivided census tracts;
6.and that they are electorally competitive as long as the aforementioned criteria are satisfied.[8][9][10]



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redistricting_in_Arizona

Arizona a "red" state has 6 Democratic and 5 Republican Congress people.

[Ptah]

14. Home page of The Independent Redistricting Commission:

Mission: The Independent Redistricting Commission's mission is to redraw Arizona’s
congressional and legislative districts to reflect the results of the most recent census.
The concept of one-person, one-vote dictates that districts should be roughly equal
in population. Other factors to be considered are the federal Voting Rights Act,
district shape, geographical features, respect for communities of interest and
potential competitiveness. The state Constitution requires the commissioners – two Republicans,
two Democrats and an independent chairwoman –
to start from scratch rather than redraw existing districts.

http://azredistricting.org/
----------------

Thanks, grantcart.

[dimbear]

7. It should be done by an expert system, a computer program. It is done by power drunk avid

folks in back rooms. We're doing a little better out here in California, as noted above.

[jmowreader]

10. Power-drunk avid folks in back rooms can design expert systems to do whatever they want

Think about how electronic voting systems can throw elections at the speed of light...and, theoretically, those things should be able to count votes far better than humans.

[bhikkhu]

8. Very badly and to our detriment, in most cases

A good article on it here: http://blog.constitutioncenter.org/2011/05/redistricting-gerrymandering-and-the-constitution/

[DURHAM D]

12. It is very partisan in most states and the winner, of course,

depends on who controls the legislature and governor's office.

One for our side is the 12th in North Carolina. Link to map of the district:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:North_Carolina_12th_Congressional_District_(National_Atlas).gif

Obviously it looks strange.



From Cong. Mel Watt's wikipedia entry -

Racial Gerrymandering
In 1994, the existence of his district was challenged as an instance of racial gerrymandering. The accusation was found to be true, but upheld as "narrowly tailored to further the state's compelling interest in complying with the Voting Rights Act".

From wikipedia regarding the 12th district -

North Carolina's 12th congressional district is located in central North Carolina and comprises portions of Charlotte, Winston-Salem, Greensboro, Lexington, Salisbury, Concord, and High Point. It is an example of gerrymandering.[2] It was one of two minority-majority Congressional districts created in the state in the 1990s. Since the 2010 census, it has a small plurality of whites.

Link to wiki entry for the 12th - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Carolina's_12th_congressional_district

[MineralMan]

16. It varies state by state.

So, there is no simple answer. It is a state issue, as are most issues having to do with elections. The Constitution sets it up that way. Somestates have a non partisan method. Others are very partisan.