US House Redistricting: Pennsylvania

[Brittain33]

PA-4 was specifically drawn for Hart, and you see who is holding it.

PA-4 was preserved the way it was in the 1990s at Hart's request, which isn't the same thing. She resisted the legislature's wish to make it a safer seat for Republicans because she prized her cross-party appeal and thought it would be an advantage to get her to the Senate after Specter retired in 2010. So it's more marginal than it needed to be, and we got Altmire.

[Brittain33]

PA-4 was specifically drawn for Hart, and you see who is holding it.

PA-4 was preserved the way it was in the 1990s at Hart's request, which isn't the same thing. She resisted the legislature's wish to make it a safer seat for Republicans because she prized her cross-party appeal and thought it would be an advantage to get her to the Senate after Specter retired in 2010. So it's more marginal than it needed to be, and we got Altmire.

I wonder if it would be possible to do the Murtha/Mascara trick again, this time with Altmire and Critz.

You can put Altmire's home in Doyle's district very easily. But I just played around with the Redistricting App and keeping PA-14 as Pitt based, it's almost impossible to put Beaver Falls/New Castle, Johnstown, and Fayette County in the same district without it making the current PA-12 look graceful. It might be possible to reconfigure PA-14 and PA-12 drastically, but PA-14 is pretty well-packed with Dems as it is and then Murphy is vulnerable.

[Brittain33]

1.  As noted, Altmire does not have to live in the district.  He must be a resident of the state.

It's not a legal issue, but it's a good way to cause headaches for the person involved and open them up to attacks in the primary and the general for not living in the district. Pennsylvania has a history of taking this into account, it's why PA-7 reached into Marcus Hook to include Curt Weldon's home.

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It's not just that it has to look awful, it's that you'd have to resort to single-precinct chains running for 50+ miles to get from Beaver County to Cambria County and back down to southwestern Pennsylvania to both lock up all the Democratic votes and not exceed maximum population. That's simply not going to happen.

You can say no one cares how it looks, but in reality, you'd never see a true monstrosity like this which links New York City to Buffalo in multiple districts. That's not redistricting, it's mapsturbation.

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Misunderstanding here; I wrote "cross-party," not "cross-county." She liked that she drew the support of anti-abortion, pro-gun Democrats and thought that was her leverage into statewide office.

[Brittain33]

The connection in this version of PA-4 has a much greater width than a highway. 

Have you been able to use the App successfully? If so, I'd really like to see a map of two districts with ~700,000 people, one that concentrates Dems in Pittsburgh and the river valleys without sloughing off too many Dem precincts to Murphy, and one which links the valley towns both above and below Pittsburgh with Johnstown. That little spur in PA-8 connects towns just a few miles apart. I contend that this can't be done across much greater distances like that between Johnstown and the Ohio border. We are at an impasse until one of us draws a map.

[Brittain33]

http://gardow.com/davebradlee/redistricting/launchapp.html

You need to have Microsoft Silverlight installed, too. It should prompt a download.

[Brittain33]

Take a look at the Dem concentration Johnny created here in PA-4 and now imagine it also including Johnstown... and also contorting Republican districts on either side of it at equal population.

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=97085.msg2592916#msg2592916

[Brittain33]

Holden isn't switching.

It will be interesting to see how they deal with Barletta and Marino. The former is definitely more of a star within the party but the leadership might prefer the latter.

Why would the leadership prefer Marino?

I think he's more of an establishment guy than Barletta. Barletta has always been more of a wildcard/more in touch with the grassroots.

Aren't they both problematic in their own ways? Do other Republicans in Pa. value Barletta or are they wary of him and what he represents?

[Brittain33]

I clicked on a random South Philly block in Google Street View to see what the houses were like and one of them was flying the "Don't Tread on Me" flag.

[Brittain33]

There is plenty of interesting gossip in this discussion, much of it different from speculation we've made before.

http://www.politicspa.com/exclusive-pa%E2%80%99s-gop-congessional-delegation-coming-to-harrisburg-to-discuss-redistricting-scenarios/22138/

Critz is protected because neighboring Republicans don't want more Dem voters... but Altmire's district could be made more Republican without being dismantled. (So how do they account for lost population in the west?)

Merging Schwartz and Fattah is discussed. Maybe this is what KP was alluding to?

No Republican votes wasted on shoring up Barletta. He sinks or swims on his own. 

[Brittain33]

How can they possibly combine Schwartz and Fattah? That would be an immediate suit on intentional dilution of the black vote, and there's no way they can create just two Democratic seats in the Philly metro.

Maybe they want to take out Schwartz as a potential statewide candidate and would create a different 3rd Dem district with her home in the 2nd?

[Brittain33]

What I recall was that the 4th could have been made more Republican than it was, but Melissa Hart asked to keep it somewhat competitive, because it burnished her credentials for a future statewide run.

[Brittain33]

Rumors that Republican bits of North Allegheny will go into Tim Murphy's district, making a combined PA-4/PA-12 easier for Altmire to win.

http://www.politicspa.com/redistricting-watch-pittsburgh’s-north-hills-may-not-end-up-in-the-4th-district/27501/

I wonder if his district is then going to end up even uglier than the current PA-12, going from the Ohio border to Johnstown and then back under PA-18 to the SW corner of the state.

[Brittain33]

Rumors of a leaked map showing Holden getting Scranton but not Wilkes-Barre (!)

http://citizensvoice.com/news/reapportionment-effort-favors-barletta-marino-1.1234491

[Brittain33]

Seems they will indeed not get too greedy in the southwest, either.

The counties they are giving to Barletta indicate how much to the west Shuster's district is shifting.

[Brittain33]

If the 5th district loses Lycoming and Tioga to the 10th, what does that mean? Splitting Erie County and putting some Democrats from the 3rd into the 5th.

http://www.goerie.com/article/20111120/NEWS02/311209955/Part-of-Erie-County-expected-to-be-carved-out-of-3rd-Congressional-District

Presumably this helps the 3rd slide south and soak up some territory released by the merger of 4th and 12th. Perhaps even some Democratic territory in Beaver County, and that's why they have to split Erie? What else could it be?

[Brittain33]

NePa Fajita!

[Brittain33]

Dave Wasserman says via Tweeter

"PA MAP: Hearing rumors GOP delegation very concerned that legislature's draft map = 2001-style overreach, particularly in SW PA"

Between that, the Gingrich surge, and the TX map, this is all becoming too good to be true.

C'mon, Pubbies. PA should totally be a 14-4 map. Anything less is leaving money on the table.

[Brittain33]

"PA Map: delegation unhappy w/ proposed changes to #PA18 Murphy, #PA05 Thompson CDs in order to help Turzai ally state Rep. Jim Christiana"

I take it this means Torie's octopus reaches up to grab the Dem heart of PA-4, and what remains is recrafted as a more Republican district at the expense of the districts named in the tweet.

Another tweet mentions that Johnstown goes to PA-9. So perhaps they dismantle PA-12 and give those SW Dem, anti-Obama counties to Murphy.

[Brittain33]

The Keystone Kops are going to release their gerrymander on Monday.

[Brittain33]

Message to PA GOP: I DOUBLE DOG DARE YOU TO OVERREACH ON REAPPORTIONMENT!

This is exactly what I was talking about. Take it out of this thread.

Woofing and gloating about redistricting is a big problem on this board... I started doing it in response to people on the other side, it just started making me feel and look like an a-hole without anyone else changing. Unless and until it becomes something moderators want to check or people decide to control themselves, we're going to have an ongoing tide of negativity surrounding redistricting.

[Brittain33]

I like how we're being teased with bits of info without any draft maps, and have been for months, btw.

I didn't post the link, but someone said Monday is the date for the map, so this has been ramping up deliberately for the last week or two. We've been getting stuff from Phil on and off for months but it's only recently been in the news.

[Brittain33]

They'll have it done by Thursday night at the latest since all of the big shots will have to be in NYC by Friday morning at the latest.

Looks like they punted it until past the PA Society meeting.

[Brittain33]

The leaping gazelle!

[Brittain33]

Is anyone running the show? How are they going to finalize a map and who's going to make that decision? This sure looks to be leading a compromise that helps Republicans some but has all sorts of ugliness and inefficiency in it... (I think someone said that upthread.)

[Brittain33]

What is that green mess in the middle of Montgomery County?

That map is almost Ohio bad. Not quite.