US House Redistricting: Ohio

[krazen1211]

http://www.cleveland.com/open/index.ssf/2011/10/rpeubclians_say_they_are_close.html

That would have the effect of making solidly Republican districts in the Dayton and Cincinnati areas slightly more competitive for Democratic candidates. It would also bump up by a few points the black voting-age population in a solidly Democratic-leaning district in Franklin County.




It is very easy to combine western Hamilton County, Cincinnati (minus Norwood), and Clermont County into a solid Republican district.

[Torie]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

[TJ in Oregon]

If you pull Boehner out of Dayton, you can have him grab most of the suburban Cincinnati blacks without it looking too tortured (you can do it with Schmidt but it looks horrible).

I don't remember exactly what you end up with, but it's somewhere in the neighborhood of R+2 or R+3. The other thing to keep in mind is that Obama overperformed compared to most Democrats in Cincinnati because of the increase in black turnout in '08. Any year when he's not on the ballot, the "marginal" seat is pretty safe for the GOP.

[Torie]

If you pull Boehner out of Dayton, you can have him grab most of the suburban Cincinnati blacks without it looking too tortured (you can do it with Schmidt but it looks horrible).

I don't remember exactly what you end up with, but it's somewhere in the neighborhood of R+2 or R+3. The other thing to keep in mind is that Obama overperformed compared to most Democrats in Cincinnati because of the increase in black turnout in '08. Any year when he's not on the ballot, the "marginal" seat is pretty safe for the GOP.

That seems about right, but that is a pretty thin number, particularly since the trends kind of suck.  I doubt Boehner will get the blacks though. I suspect it will require Chabot to take some of Clermont and Warren. There is a substantially black town on the Butler County border that I put in Boehner's CD that is kind of its own black island. I wonder if it will be shaved off from where most of the blacks live near the Ohio River.

[krazen1211]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

[Torie]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

That is a pretty good map Krazen.

[muon2]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

A similar link with Warren instead of Clermont would protect all the incumbents.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Why would blacks want a map like that? It hardly increases their influence, nor is any incumbent going to call for it (the big difference between this and Missouri.)

[krazen1211]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

A similar link with Warren instead of Clermont would protect all the incumbents.

Yeah, but I couldn't figure out how to nicely do that while also maintaining all of Cincinnati in 1 district.

[muon2]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

A similar link with Warren instead of Clermont would protect all the incumbents.

Yeah, but I couldn't figure out how to nicely do that while also maintaining all of Cincinnati in 1 district.

I took the highlighted phrase above as the operative goal. That allows a split of Cinci.

[nclib]

It will be a bit tricky to put all of the Cinci blacks in one CD without making it fairly marginal, unless those precincts are combined with the most hyper GOP ones in the area.

Precisely. This will displace Mean Jean a bit but no district is really going to switch.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/210/cinci1.png/

A similar link with Warren instead of Clermont would protect all the incumbents.

Yeah, but I couldn't figure out how to nicely do that while also maintaining all of Cincinnati in 1 district.

I took the highlighted phrase above as the operative goal. That allows a split of Cinci.

Does that map place all of Cinci's white liberals in Schmidt's CD?

[krazen1211]

http://www.cantonrep.com/newsnow/x422404093/Kucinich-lobbies-for-GOP-redistricting-plan

An Ohio congressman facing a primary fight against a fellow Democrat is lobbying for an embattled GOP redistricting plan, asking voters to call state lawmakers on his behalf.

One Democrat targeted by the robo-calls, state Rep. Timothy DeGeeter of Parma, said Wednesday that he received such a call at his home and fewer than a dozen phone calls from residents who contacted him in response to U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s overture.

[TJ in Oregon]

http://www.cantonrep.com/newsnow/x422404093/Kucinich-lobbies-for-GOP-redistricting-plan

An Ohio congressman facing a primary fight against a fellow Democrat is lobbying for an embattled GOP redistricting plan, asking voters to call state lawmakers on his behalf.

One Democrat targeted by the robo-calls, state Rep. Timothy DeGeeter of Parma, said Wednesday that he received such a call at his home and fewer than a dozen phone calls from residents who contacted him in response to U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s overture.

This is ingenious, the self-serving nature of Dennis! strikes again. I'm going to love watching him fight the Democrats to preserve the ridiculous GOP map just because it was gerrymandered to save him.

I do wonder, though exactly what the Democrats are asking for in Cincinnati, they may be asking for a district that contains all of the blacks in the metropolitan area. Since, there are very few white liberal areas and the few that exist are mostly directly west of downtown, drawing them out would be nearly impossible. Chabot actually lives in that area and it's sandwiched between the black areas and the hyper-GOP western suburbs that the GOP would need to keep in OH-1. It's hard because Cincinnati's racial voting patterns don't look much different than New Orleans or Memphis.

[minionofmidas]

There's certainly not going to be a compromise that gives Chabot more than a ~50% survival chance.

Kucinich may of course be talking himself straight out of a job, whether the map survives or not. I can imagine Kaptur's ads in the Toledo media market... he's going to get so destroyed in the western half of the district.
Kaptur's pro-life record may count against her... but will the relevant donors flock to Kucinich? And is he making it any easier for them, defending that map?

[Torie]

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How do you know this Lewis? If all the blacks want is to have their folks not divided between CD's, what you suggest is not what the story suggests the blacks are demanding in exchange for their votes. Am I missing something?

[krazen1211]

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How do you know this Lewis? If all the blacks want is to have their folks not divided between CD's, what you suggest is not what the story suggests the blacks are demanding in exchange for their votes. Am I missing something?

The alleged new demand is safe districts for all 5 current incumbents.

[TJ in Oregon]

There's certainly not going to be a compromise that gives Chabot more than a ~50% survival chance.

Even if you gerrymander the districts to try and get rid of Chabot, he’d still have a better than 50% chance of surviving unless you threw county and city lines out the window and drew him into Hamilton and Middleton. There are about 300,000 people who live in black, heavily Democratic areas and virtually everything else around is extremely Republican.  To give him the boot without an equally hideous map, you would need a Democratic gerrymander and a 2008-style wave among black voters. The PVI in Hamilton County is incredibly misleading because it assumes a black turnout like 2008. If you drew a district entirely in Hamilton County including all the black areas and purposely cutting out the 80% Republican suburbs to keep the 65% Republican suburbs, you would still give Chabot about a 70% chance of getting re-elected just because the 2008 numbers are skewed in that area. And Steve Dreihaus isn’t exactly primed to make a comeback now that he’s suing the Susan B. Anthony List, so you would need to find a new candidate used to appealing to swing voters.

Kucinich may of course be talking himself straight out of a job, whether the map survives or not. I can imagine Kaptur's ads in the Toledo media market... he's going to get so destroyed in the western half of the district.
Kaptur's pro-life record may count against her... but will the relevant donors flock to Kucinich? And is he making it any easier for them, defending that map?

There are a couple underlying assumptions here that are problematic. The Democratic primary won’t likely be about abortion because neither candidate is particularly loud about that issue. If the roles were reversed and the woman was pro-choice and the man pro-life, it would matter much more because Emily’s List would run adds against the pro-life man. But the necessary interest groups will likely sit out this one. I also wouldn’t assume that Kucinich’s current district is more pro-choice than Kaptur’s. It would be close between them and I could just as easily see the opposite being true. Kaptur actually has more of a history of being challenged from the right than from the left.

The real fight will be one of a political machine pitted against a competent Congresswoman  with a regional base in tiny, chopped up Toledo. Kaptur has done poorly in the eastern tail of her district for years because she hasn’t devoted much time there. Part of the reason why I suspect I received a reply to a letter I sent her last year was because I have a Sandusky address. She is having trouble getting support outside of Toledo. Kucinich will have the exact same problem. His support is built on a political machine from Cleveland issues involving lighting companies in the ‘70s. You wouldn’t believe the number of people who still vote for him because of that. He’ll be harmed a lot by the Toledo part of the district both in the primary and general election, but he will have a clear primary advantage because the GOP, in making the district look as hideous as they did, drew much more of the Cleveland metropolitan area into it than the Toledo area.

Kucinich’s base is primarily poor working class people, not the type who would make large donations. So, almost all of his donations come from trips to the east and west coasts. He never has relied on in-district fundraising before. It won’t hurt him financially at all.

[minionofmidas]

How do you know this Lewis? If all the blacks want is to have their folks not divided between CD's, what you suggest is not what the story suggests the blacks are demanding in exchange for their votes. Am I missing something?

All the plans presented above that leave him safe enough? They all split some Blacks off.

50% was just a ballpark figure, of course. And Republicans may like his chances better than Democrats in the end product.



These are the Black or part-Black parts of Hamilton County. 285k people, 79.7% Obama. Do the math. Of the areas enclosed, the northern one and the little bit by the river are quite marginal; the mid-southern one is almost as Democratic as the sum of the parts in yellow.

[minionofmidas]

The PVI in Hamilton County is incredibly misleading because it assumes a black turnout like 2008.

Yeah; that's why I also looked at the "average" thingy when I drew my last plan.

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Yeah, I got that.

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Yeah, I don't really see this as contradicting me at all, more corroborating - Kaptur has nothing to fear from that angle.

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'kay, so that's interesting, and so is

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Quite relevant if *entirely* true.

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They drew it purposefully hoping to get rid of Kaptur, not Kucinich. Also, given that they weren't doing the Columbus chop, Latta and Jordan could safely soak up some heavily Democratic areas... unlike any Northeastern Republican.

[Torie]

Nice map Lewis. I guess when the article says "Cincinnati," does that mean just the city, or the entire county of Hamilton I guess. Some of those black northern burbs should be appended to Boehner's CD of course.   And actually, per my recollection, some of them are not all that Dem - nothing like the black precincts nearer the river.

[minionofmidas]

Nice map Lewis. I guess when the article says "Cincinnati," does that mean just the city, or the entire county of Hamilton I guess. Some of those black northern burbs should be appended to Boehner's CD of course.   And actually, per my recollection, some of them are not all that Dem - nothing like the black precincts nearer the river.

Yeah, that map includes, as a rule of thumb, the 25% Black and up areas or so. Overall it's 59% Black or something.

The thing is, there's a surprising lot of such 25-60% Black areas around in Cincinnati. And yeah, not all of them vote 80%+ Democratic anyways.

[minionofmidas]

Just for hilarity's sake, this map kind of defines the Cinci district's boundaries by "where the really heavy R precincts begin", except in Hamilton because I reached the population target (all the actually Democratic parts are included though). It's not *quite* the perfect Dem pack, but closeish. The string along the river is (except for the very last precinct) part of the city of Cincinnati. It's also solid (but not superheavy) R - I played with the map a little more after uploading, and the performance can be minimally improved by excising it. In the last version I have it, it's 59.3% Obama, 55.7% average. I think the uploaded version is 59.1 or .2%. It's not *that* egregious, really - certain not as egregious as the current map (never mind the 2010 plan). Really stands out how far inside, and how dense, the superheavy Republican suburbs go on the southwest side.

[Verily]

There's certainly not going to be a compromise that gives Chabot more than a ~50% survival chance.

Even if you gerrymander the districts to try and get rid of Chabot, he’d still have a better than 50% chance of surviving unless you threw county and city lines out the window and drew him into Hamilton and Middleton. There are about 300,000 people who live in black, heavily Democratic areas and virtually everything else around is extremely Republican.  To give him the boot without an equally hideous map, you would need a Democratic gerrymander and a 2008-style wave among black voters. The PVI in Hamilton County is incredibly misleading because it assumes a black turnout like 2008. If you drew a district entirely in Hamilton County including all the black areas and purposely cutting out the 80% Republican suburbs to keep the 65% Republican suburbs, you would still give Chabot about a 70% chance of getting re-elected just because the 2008 numbers are skewed in that area. And Steve Dreihaus isn’t exactly primed to make a comeback now that he’s suing the Susan B. Anthony List, so you would need to find a new candidate used to appealing to swing voters.

You don't need to gerrymander to get a district that would probably throw Chabot out. A district that excises the western suburbs in Hamilton County instead of the eastern ones (and is still entirely contained in Hamilton County and has very smooth edges following municipal boundaries) is just over 56% Obama and 53% generic Democrat. That's enough to make Chabot likely to lose (especially in a Presidential year), although certainly not guaranteed.

Not that there is any chance of the Republicans drawing such a district, of course.

[TJ in Oregon]

That's quite a bit cleaner than I expected actually, and yes that would doom Chabot.

[TJ in Oregon]

You don't need to gerrymander to get a district that would probably throw Chabot out. A district that excises the western suburbs in Hamilton County instead of the eastern ones (and is still entirely contained in Hamilton County and has very smooth edges following municipal boundaries) is just over 56% Obama and 53% generic Democrat. That's enough to make Chabot likely to lose (especially in a Presidential year), although certainly not guaranteed.

Not that there is any chance of the Republicans drawing such a district, of course.

Perhaps I have a little bit of "homer" in my perception of who would win, but I would still expect the Eastern Hamilton map to favor Chabot slightly. The generic %s for Ohio are slanted toward the Democrats because I think they use 2006 numbers. The whole state is 54.5% Democratic according to those when Ohio is really about as close to 50/50 as it gets. This would probably be rated a "toss-up" by most people, but man I'd still put my money on Chabot. 2008 was a once in a generation election for black turnout. It will be high still in 2012, but not as high as 2008. In an off-year Chabot would have no problem.