US House Redistricting: Michigan

[ilikeverin]

You seem to have a spare Okemos precinct in the Lansing/Flint district.  Have you split it Okemos/East Lansing, then?  That would be... strange, but Okemos would probably like it.

[ilikeverin]

How does putting Lansing in with Detroit exurbs make sense for any reason beyond purely partisan ones?

Well, it doesn't fit anywhere else.  Grand Rapids to the West, the Tri-cities/Flint to the North East, and South-central MI to the South.  Each of those areas has its own district that is a pretty good COI, so Lansing gets shafted and shoved with the extra Detroit Burbs.  Its of course drawn in a way to make it an R seat, but its not like they're just trying to spite the city.

Ummm... No? You're being a partisan hack? The Lansing metro (Ingham, Eaton, Shiawassee, Clinton) is much, much clearer community of interest than "random small cities plus parts of Lansing and some suburbs" that MI-07 consists of.

Yeah, I'm continually confounded by the tendency to divide Lansing.

[ilikeverin]

That map seems to make a lot of sense, Verily, though I'd want to see the Detroit-area districts a little closer.

[ilikeverin]

I'd like to see krazen or BigSkyBob draw a map as to what they'd consider "fair", but they'll probably just argue that the current disgusting GOP gerrymander is a fair map.

A fair map would give the Democrats 6 districts; 1 in Flint/Saginaw, 1 in Detroit, 1 in Lower Oakland/Macomb, 1 in Wayne County, 1 in Washentaw/remainder of Wayne, and perhaps 1 in central Oakland. There is no other compelling strength of Democratic votes to guarantee them a 7th seat unless you decide to exclude extremely rational choices like attacking Ingram to neighboring Livingston County as was done in Debbie Stabenow's district.

The proposed maps include curious choices to needlessly reconfigure compact districts like the 6th that nicely sit in a corner of the state. Which are of course valid choices that adhere to municipal boundaries, but do not preclude the idea of other valid choices.

This is the sticking point--attaching Ingham and Livingston Counties to one another is not a rational choice. That's not a comment on whether it favors either party. (It would favor the Democrats to do so if the additional population thereafter were acquired from Eaton or Shiawassee County instead of outer Oakland County.) But they are completely and totally different in all ways; the fact that they are neighbors does not make connecting them reasonable or rational or intelligible for any reasons other than partisanship.

The same, of course, is true of connecting Washtenaw and Livingston (which you hypocritically aren't advocating, of course because it always favors the Democrats) or Gennessee to Livingston (again, no more unreasonable than connecting Ingham and Livingston, but also favors the Democrats). Livingston only reasonably connects to its fellow Detroit suburbs in Oakland and/or Wayne and the extreme NE corner of Washtenaw; it shares nothing in common with its other neighbors.

You fail to understand the basic meaning of "community of interest".

Of course it is a valid choice. The major highways such as I-96 run east-west, and the historical nature of the link sets precedent for it to be maintained.

You are, um, clearly not from Michigan.

[ilikeverin]

Haha, I love the grey district

[ilikeverin]

What do I see? The Dem map.

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_documents/mich_redistricting.pdf

Livingston County paired with Lansing.

Oakland County cut 5 ways.

Not even 1 district entirely within Wayne County.

Oakland to Macomb double cross.

That's almost as bad as the Republican map. In fact, in some places, it's worse.

Yeah, that's a fail.  They seem to have copied literally all of the outstate regions from the Republican map.  Classy.

Well, hey, underscores why MI Dems are often just as bad as MI Reps.  I'm glad I voted Green for Governor

What's going on their in their MI-12 and MI-15?  Did they just decide to use two identical colors next to each other?

[ilikeverin]

What do I see? The Dem map.

http://hosted.ap.org/specials/interactives/_documents/mich_redistricting.pdf

Livingston County paired with Lansing.

Oakland County cut 5 ways.

Not even 1 district entirely within Wayne County.

Oakland to Macomb double cross.

That's almost as bad as the Republican map. In fact, in some places, it's worse.

Yeah, that's a fail.  They seem to have copied literally all of the outstate regions from the Republican map.  Classy.

Well, hey, underscores why MI Dems are often just as bad as MI Reps.  I'm glad I voted Green for Governor

What's going on their in their MI-12 and MI-15?  Did they just decide to use two identical colors next to each other?

No, there is no MI-15.

So they just put the number 15 on the maps for funsies?  Ooookay.

[ilikeverin]

How did you split Ingham up, exactly?  I'm curious what district I'd've ended up in.

[ilikeverin]

How did you split Ingham up, exactly?  I'm curious what district I'd've ended up in.

Your wish is my command - of course!  I did the map zoom in aerial format, the better to assist you. Cheers.

Ugh, that's grotesque; well done!  Yeah, the horridness of city/township boundaries in Michigan can hardly be overstated, and is one of the reasons I assisted in the anti-BigSkyBob shouting match earlier in this thread; the notion that counties, cities, townships, and whatnot actually correspond to anything meaningful is quite demonstrably false in the case of Michigan.  If I'm reading the map correctly, it looks like I'd be in a completely different CD from two of my best friends who live literally across the street from campus.  Another friend of mine, who lives with his wife in DeWitt and commutes from there, would be in still a third district.  Brilliant!

It looks like those random patches of blue are indeed parkland.

You might have Snyder to thank for the boundaries ending up where they are.  There's certainly things to complain about, but he actually seems set on governing Michigan from the center-right, which is an awkward place to be with the Michigan GOP so far to the right.  He was going to be tested with the homophobic "anti-"bullying bill that was going to be passed, but thankfully the State Senate made it more reasonable; perhaps this will be the next test.