US House Redistricting: Ohio

[MattTX]

Torie, why do you bother with land contiguity for the 9th District? Why not just use Lake Erie water contiguity to collect Toledo, Cleveland, and any precincts you want to pick up in between?

If you did that, the connection between the two parts of the 16th District would not look so bad. In addition, you probably could also add a few "pubbie points," as you so amusingly call them, by removing any less Democratic connecting precincts that you are currently including in the 9th along the shore of Lake Erie.

[MattTX]

Exactly. Unless there is a state law provision against using water contiguity, you can use it (at least no court that I know of has said that you can't). People might complain about using water contiguity just for partisan gerrymandering, but it doesn't look any worse than the way you currently have the 16th District.