Local officials are putting the finishing touches on a plan to update the county’s voting districts, one that will be submitted for state approval before year’s end.
Using data from the decennial census, boundaries countywide will be adjusted to make each district have nearly equal population. The agreed on proposal will shift some voters from District 4 into District 1.
“Federal requirements allow for up to a 10 percent variance, but we’re told by the state that the deviation should be as close to zero as possible,” said John Campbell, custodian of elections for the county.
Last month the county commission asked that the five-member board of elections prepare several options for redistricting, one that Commission Chairman Keith Greene said should have “less than a 10 percent variance.”
Following the regularly scheduled commission meeting, six different redistricting plans were presented for discussion.
The plans varied widely.
Option one would only affect some voters in Woodstation near the Chambers precinct and result in a projected deviation of 1.8 percent.
Option two involves Districts 1 and 2 trading the Duncan Park and Chambers precincts, resulting in a deviation of about 4.3 percent.
A third option would create totally new districts by shifting some Boynton precinct voters to either District 1 or 3, leading to a deviation of just under 5 percent.
Two plans call for scrapping current precincts and redrawing district boundaries from scratch. Both such plans, while doable, would be very costly and time consuming.
A sixth and final plan calls for making no changes whatsoever and would result in maintaing the current deviation of about 11.9 percent.
After studying the proposals, the commissioners decided that option one which relies on shifting 895 voters from District 4 to District 1 would be the prudent choice.
“That change will involve only one split precinct,” election board chairman Nina Crawford said.
Greene appointed Campbell, newly elected commissioner Jeff Long and Tonya Moore, the county’s chief elections official, to a committee that will present the adopted plan to the state’s Reapportionment Committee for approval.
“We looked at all options,” Moore said. “The plan we are taking to Atlanta will involve moving some voters from Woodstation into Chambers.”
The plan will be finalized with help from the state officials so it can be submitted to the General Assembly for 2012 session that begins in January.