How many people in the built-up Selah/Yakima portion of the 8th? Any way that could be avoided, perhaps by a huge counterclockwise shift?
It's about 55,000 people. It could be avoided with a 3rd taking more of Yakima --> 8th taking more of Pierce --> 10th taking in most of Lewis. This would result in another county getting split up though, along with the 10th becoming more Republican.
It's unfortunate for those affected, but as with the current map (which splits Olympia right down the middle) someone somewhere is going to have be split up to make the numbers work.
What if the 8th district was the only district to cross the Cascades, not just the only district to cross the Cascades north of the Columbia River Gorge + the range(s) that the Satus Pass crosses, but the Cascades period (or rather the line between Whatcom, Skagit, Snohomish, King, Pierce, Lewis and Skamania counties on the one hand and Okanogan, Chelan, Kittitas, Yakima and Klickitat counties on the other)? After Kittitas County, how much of Yakima County could go into the 8th district? Could all of the core Yakima area be included in the 8th district without the 4th district (which would include the remainder of Yakima County and Klickitat County, as well as the Tri-Cities area, the line between the 4th and 5th perhaps becoming more a line of latitude) relying on the Satus Pass for functional contiguity (ie. all of the 4th district's portion of Yakima County connected by decent roads to Benton County; one could pretend that the Satus pass was at the Klickitat-Yakima boundary to avoind splitting Klickitat County, or better yet have southern Yakima County (but a portion connected to Benton County via decent roads) in the 4th along with Klickitat to make the distinction between Satus Pass and the county boundary irrelevant)? How many people live in Klickitat County north of Satus (or Yakima County south of Satus) anyway? Sounder spoke in page 1 of this thread as if his map (which used the Klickitat-Yakima boundary as a boundary between congressional districts) relied on Snoqualmie Pass for functional contiguity rather than Satus Pass, and through all the dabate as to Snoqualmie v. Satus I don't remember people pointing out the range(s) Satus crosses doesn't follow a county boundary.
If Yakima County were still to be deeply divided under such a plan, perhaps some of Skamania County could remain in or some more territory go to the 4th to make for a less deep division of Yakima. Alternatively, some of Klickitat county could go into a Western Washington district if that made sense from a community of interest perspective. I know most people here want to have the one trans-Cascade district go along the Columbia Gorge but I thought I'd get people thinking about how the boundary between the 4th and the (3rd?) in a crossing Snoqualmie scenario could be further west than Satus and the Klickitat-Benton county boundary. Isn't Klickitat county considered part of Eastern Washington (as opposed to Western Washington) after all?
