Talk Elections

General Politics => Political Geography & Demographics => Topic started by: Sol on November 16, 2014, 09:56:10 PM



Title: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Sol on November 16, 2014, 09:56:10 PM
I don't know about you all, but I've been craving some sort of redistricting activity. So I think it would be fun to have some sort of redistricting commission, to act as a sort of model for how these things will work  out in real life.

Like most real-life commissions, we should have a bipartisan balance of Democrats/Left-leaners and Pubbies/Righ-leaners. So maybe four of each?

Also, we'll need criteria to use. I suppose we can decide that together.

What state would be good?

Anyone interested?

Moderator's note: The definitions and criteria (https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=203858.0) adopted by the FRC are in a separate locked thread for easy access.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 16, 2014, 10:00:25 PM
I suggest we do either IL or do Texas.  And I'll love to be in on this.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: RedSLC on November 16, 2014, 10:01:10 PM
I'd like to be in on this as well.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Dixie Reborn on November 16, 2014, 10:41:13 PM
Count me in!


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Frodo on November 16, 2014, 10:57:31 PM
You might want to include some (genuine) independents as well.  Averroes Nix, Mr. Morden, Mr. Wulfric, among others that haven't immediately come to mind...   


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 16, 2014, 11:00:02 PM
I would also love to have Muon in on this, he might have some fun with this.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Miles on November 16, 2014, 11:03:15 PM
I'm probably non a 'genuine' independent, but I have lots of experience making fair maps; Jerry can vouch for me!


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Sol on November 16, 2014, 11:04:29 PM
You might want to include some (genuine) independents as well.  Averroes Nix, Mr. Morden, Mr. Wulfric, among others that haven't immediately come to mind...   

Well, I was suggesting left-leaning/right-leaning to include those folks. But if they wanna come in as independents, they're welcome. Rules ain't strict.



Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 16, 2014, 11:35:18 PM
Let me propose the following. A commission of five or seven members is determined by lot from among those interested with no party having a majority. The commission agrees to the criteria and software (presumably DRA) and is in charge of making sure that the criteria are followed. They can also be arbiters of things like VRA compliance. I'd be happy to act as a consultant on measurable criteria, based on the various rubrics we've tested here in the past.

Once the criteria are set for a state then the public (including the commission) can propose maps for the state for a fixed period of time. Proposed maps are posted here so that the public can view all maps, and propose new maps that improve upon existing proposals. At the end of the time period the commission votes from those maps that best meet the criteria. In this way the map is crowdsourced under the auspices of the commission, and everyone gets some say in the process.

As to the state, I would suggest VA since its congressional plan was just struck down by the court, pending appeal.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Sol on November 16, 2014, 11:57:46 PM
Let me propose the following. A commission of five or seven members is determined by lot from among those interested with no party having a majority. The commission agrees to the criteria and software (presumably DRA) and is in charge of making sure that the criteria are followed. They can also be arbiters of things like VRA compliance. I'd be happy to act as a consultant on measurable criteria, based on the various rubrics we've tested here in the past.

Once the criteria are set for a state then the public (including the commission) can propose maps for the state for a fixed period of time. Proposed maps are posted here so that the public can view all maps, and propose new maps that improve upon existing proposals. At the end of the time period the commission votes from those maps that best meet the criteria. In this way the map is crowdsourced under the auspices of the commission, and everyone gets some say in the process.

As to the state, I would suggest VA since its congressional plan was just struck down by the court, pending appeal.

I think that sounds fine. :)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Del Tachi on November 17, 2014, 02:59:32 PM
Sounds like fun!  I'll submit maps to the commission if its not too intensive (i.e., don't do a state like CA, TX, or IL)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: traininthedistance on November 17, 2014, 04:28:00 PM
I suppose I'm the sort of person who ought to be involved in this, and it sounds like a great idea, but I might be a bit too busy to commit to anything ATM.  Um... put me down for a firm "probably".


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 17, 2014, 08:34:33 PM
Sounds good to me, I'm game! :)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 17, 2014, 08:51:47 PM
Here's who I have as applicants for the commission with affiliation based on avatar. You can add or remove your name as you wish. I propose that applications be accepted until Friday 11/21/14 11:59 pm EST.

Sol (I)
JerryArkansas (R)
SLCValleyMan (G)
Dixie (R)
Frodo (D)?
Miles (I)
Del Tachi (R)
traininthedistance (D)??
X (G)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: morgieb on November 17, 2014, 11:49:05 PM
Might be interested. In any case seems a good idea.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Gass3268 on November 18, 2014, 01:31:38 AM
Ugh, I wish my DRA still worked. :(


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 18, 2014, 07:37:45 AM

But you can still be selected for the commission. :)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 18, 2014, 01:03:00 PM
Oooh I want in!


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Del Tachi on November 18, 2014, 03:59:14 PM
I'm fine with being nominated :)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Frodo on November 18, 2014, 06:41:26 PM
Here's who I have as applicants for the commission with affiliation based on avatar. You can add or remove your name as you wish. I propose that applications be accepted until Friday 11/21/14 11:59 pm EST.

Sol (I)
JerryArkansas (R)
SLCValleyMan (G)
Dixie (R)
Frodo (D)?
Miles (I)
Del Tachi (R)
traininthedistance (D)??
X (G)


Thanks for the mention, but you can remove me from the list.  I was just commenting on the proposal, that's all.  I'll leave the map-drawing to those who really know what they are doing...    


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: ElectionsGuy on November 19, 2014, 12:14:08 AM
I'm interested


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 19, 2014, 01:16:08 PM
Updated list!

JerryArkansas (R)
Dixie (R)
Del Tachi (R)

traininthedistance (D)??
Averroes Nix (D)
Morgieb (D)?
Gass (D)?
Bacon King (D)

Sol (I)
Miles (I)
X (G)
SLCValleyMan (G)
Electionsguy (L)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 19, 2014, 01:40:17 PM
Also what preferences does everyone have for states? The biggest question to figure out is the number of districts we want to work with, I think. Which categories in the following tier list are acceptable to y'all? At what point, if any, will the exercise become too big or too small?

Big Four: CA/TX/FL/NY
Large States: IL/PA/OH/MI/GA/NC
Medium States: NJ/VA/WA/AZ/IN/TN/MA
Small States: MD/WI/MO/MN/AL/SC/CO
Tiny States: KY/LA/CT/OK/OR
Simple States: the rest (four districts or less)



Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 19, 2014, 03:07:10 PM
me too let me in let me in nao 


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 19, 2014, 04:16:11 PM
Also what preferences does everyone have for states? The biggest question to figure out is the number of districts we want to work with, I think. Which categories in the following tier list are acceptable to y'all? At what point, if any, will the exercise become too big or too small?

Big Four: CA/TX/FL/NY
Large States: IL/PA/OH/MI/GA/NC
Medium States: NJ/VA/WA/AZ/IN/TN/MA
Small States: MD/WI/MO/MN/AL/SC/CO
Tiny States: KY/LA/CT/OK/OR
Simple States: the rest (four districts or less)



I still think VA is most interesting since it is currently under scrutiny by the court. If the VRA makes the issue too complex in VA, I'd stick to states that are medium or smaller for an initial run.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 19, 2014, 07:17:22 PM
I think we should run four states, one after the next.

First with a simple state, next with a small, a medium/large, and if some of us want one of the big four.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Sol on November 19, 2014, 10:04:04 PM
Also what preferences does everyone have for states? The biggest question to figure out is the number of districts we want to work with, I think. Which categories in the following tier list are acceptable to y'all? At what point, if any, will the exercise become too big or too small?

Big Four: CA/TX/FL/NY
Large States: IL/PA/OH/MI/GA/NC
Medium States: NJ/VA/WA/AZ/IN/TN/MA
Small States: MD/WI/MO/MN/AL/SC/CO
Tiny States: KY/LA/CT/OK/OR
Simple States: the rest (four districts or less)



I would prefer to avoid the Big Four (Otherwise known as the computer crashers).

Of the large states, IL, PA, OH, MI can also slow down stuff (this is less of a problem in NC/GA due to smaller precinct sizes).

If people want a state with a sort of large, densely populated 'metro' feeling like NY or CA, may I suggest NJ? It has a lot of districts and tends to feel larger when one draws it.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: publicunofficial on November 20, 2014, 05:28:02 PM
Also what preferences does everyone have for states? The biggest question to figure out is the number of districts we want to work with, I think. Which categories in the following tier list are acceptable to y'all? At what point, if any, will the exercise become too big or too small?

Big Four: CA/TX/FL/NY
Large States: IL/PA/OH/MI/GA/NC
Medium States: NJ/VA/WA/AZ/IN/TN/MA
Small States: MD/WI/MO/MN/AL/SC/CO
Tiny States: KY/LA/CT/OK/OR
Simple States: the rest (four districts or less)



I would prefer to avoid the Big Four (Otherwise known as the computer crashers).

Of the large states, IL, PA, OH, MI can also slow down stuff (this is less of a problem in NC/GA due to smaller precinct sizes).

If people want a state with a sort of large, densely populated 'metro' feeling like NY or CA, may I suggest NJ? It has a lot of districts and tends to feel larger when one draws it.


NY and California crash DRA for me, but Florida and Texas are fine.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 20, 2014, 06:08:17 PM
My vote would be to start with a small state although Virginia would also be interesting for the reason Muon mentioned (also I'm a Democrat, I only have a G-OK avatar until Mecha is unbanned).


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: jimrtex on November 20, 2014, 08:49:45 PM
Maybe potential commissioners could vote for states they would be interested in (approval voting) and then count those votes after the commissioners were selected at lot.

Or perhaps rate the states + 0 -.

The first decision of the commissioners would then to be choose the state from among those which they had expressed the most interest.

This does not preclude doing additional states with the same commissioners or others.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 20, 2014, 09:43:46 PM
Some would like to start with a smaller state, so let me add another specific vote to take. I'll pick three smaller states that could also make interesting candidates that had legislative gerrymandering. If simpler is better to start, it's helpful if they don't involve the VRA and do have lots of internal political units to guide map making.

KY: 6 CDs, no VRA issues, lots of counties, bipartisan compromise for incumbents.

WI: 8 CDs, no VRA issues, townships to guide county chops, Pub gerrymander.

IN: 9 CDs, no VRA issues, townships to guide county chops, Pub gerrymander.

VA: 11 CDs, VRA issue, lots of counties and independent cities, Pub gerrymander and court challenge.

Since the non-commissioners will also be participating with maps, I think everyone should vote for the state. I like the idea of approval voting, so vote for any number of the states in the list.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 20, 2014, 09:47:01 PM
I vote for KY, it should be an easy state to start off with.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: jimrtex on November 20, 2014, 10:36:32 PM
Some would like to start with a smaller state, so let me add another specific vote to take. I'll pick three smaller states that could also make interesting candidates that had legislative gerrymandering. If simpler is better to start, it's helpful if they don't involve the VRA and do have lots of internal political units to guide map making.

KY: 6 CDs, no VRA issues, lots of counties, bipartisan compromise for incumbents.

WI: 8 CDs, no VRA issues, townships to guide county chops, Pub gerrymander.

IN: 9 CDs, no VRA issues, townships to guide county chops, Pub gerrymander.

VA: 11 CDs, VRA issue, lots of counties and independent cities, Pub gerrymander and court challenge.

Since the non-commissioners will also be participating with maps, I think everyone should vote for the state. I like the idea of approval voting, so vote for any number of the states in the list.
IN+
WI+
VA+

KY o


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 20, 2014, 10:48:47 PM
1. Wisconsin
2. Virginia
3. Kentucky
4. Indiana


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Chunk Yogurt for President! on November 20, 2014, 10:55:55 PM
I think the Congressional districts for Kentucky are pretty good as they are, I mean, Louisville actually gets a congressional district to itself instead of being split between multiple districts that extend into the rural regions of the state.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: morgieb on November 20, 2014, 11:06:13 PM
I think the best order to do it would be:

1. Virginia
2. Wisconsin
3. Indiana
4. Kentucky

Bottom two are relatively normal maps. Virginia goes top because that map has actually been struck down.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 20, 2014, 11:06:16 PM
Approve: Indiana, Virginia, Wisconsin
Disapprove: Kentucky


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: RedSLC on November 21, 2014, 12:57:26 AM
I'll submit:

-North Carolina
-Virginia
-Tennessee
-Connecticut
-Colorado
-Pennsylvania
-And most of the "simple" states.



Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 21, 2014, 01:04:34 AM
So we can submit any states we want to change?


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: publicunofficial on November 21, 2014, 01:11:55 AM
1) Virginia
2) Wisconsin
3) Indiana
4) Kentucky


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 21, 2014, 01:27:06 AM
Approve: Indiana, Virginia, Wisconsin, Washington


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 21, 2014, 01:40:59 AM
Sorry to spam the thread, but I'd like to request that you guys add Washington State to your lists.  It's map is atrocious; it basically strings (gerrymanders) all the towns North of Seattle to make the second district safe for Democrats, and combines the Seattle suburbs with heavily Republican counties in the East (which is bad taste in the first place) to make it non-competitive:

()


Terrible, terrible map.  


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 21, 2014, 02:31:09 AM
Sorry to spam the thread, but I'd like to request that you guys add Washington State to your lists.  It's map is atrocious; it basically strings (gerrymanders) all the towns North of Seattle to make the second district safe for Democrats, and combines the Seattle suburbs with heavily Republican counties in the East (which is bad taste in the first place) to make it non-competitive:

()


Terrible, terrible map. 

IIRC there are also issues about small/seasonal mountain roadways being the only routes connecting districts over the crest of the Cascade Range (and it looks like two districts cross over the range when one would have been sufficient)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: publicunofficial on November 21, 2014, 06:12:02 AM
Sorry to spam the thread, but I'd like to request that you guys add Washington State to your lists.  It's map is atrocious; it basically strings (gerrymanders) all the towns North of Seattle to make the second district safe for Democrats, and combines the Seattle suburbs with heavily Republican counties in the East (which is bad taste in the first place) to make it non-competitive:

()


Terrible, terrible map. 

IIRC there are also issues about small/seasonal mountain roadways being the only routes connecting districts over the crest of the Cascade Range (and it looks like two districts cross over the range when one would have been sufficient)

Okanogan and Whatcom are the counties that shouldn't connect due to the routes being impassible for most of the year, but they aren't connected in the current map. Chelan and Kittitas connect via major highways to King County.

Also I think the Cascades rule is overrated. You only HAVE to do it once, but unless you do it twice the 3rd has to split counties unnecessarily.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: traininthedistance on November 21, 2014, 04:00:57 PM
Think I'll have to beg out of the commission itself; I won't be able to guarantee I can be around and putting in the sort of time this project wants.

I'll probably still submit some maps from the peanut gallery.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 22, 2014, 09:25:44 AM
There is currently a tie between VA and WI for the first state for the commission. Please vote for just one of those two to break the tie. Voting will close at 11:59 EST tonight.

The following posters have applied for the commission (I think). Some posters voted for the state, but did not clearly indicate if they wanted to be considered for the commission. If that included you and you meant to be on the list, please indicate some time today. If you didn't mean to be on the list, also indicate that today. Tomorrow I'll make a random draw of five commissioners and two alternates such that no party gets a majority.

JerryArkansas (R)
Dixie (R)
Del Tachi (R)

Averroes Nix (D)
Morgieb (D)
Gass (D)
Bacon King (D)
X (D)

SLCValleyMan (G)
Fuzzybigfoot (G)

Electionsguy (L)

Sol (I)
Miles (I)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 23, 2014, 02:42:54 PM
The commissioners are

Morgieb
Miles
Fuzzybigfoot
Dixie
Del Tachi

and the alternates are

ElectionsGuy
X

I still need some tie breaking votes for the state (WI or VA).


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 23, 2014, 02:49:17 PM
Go with WI


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: ElectionsGuy on November 23, 2014, 02:53:20 PM
I can do either of Wisconsin or Virginia


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Gass3268 on November 23, 2014, 05:15:55 PM
Virginia


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 23, 2014, 08:42:08 PM
As I am not a member of the commission I will be playing the role of an interest group's representative who will be relentlessly hounding the commissioners (the interest group in question will depend on the state)


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Miles on November 23, 2014, 08:48:16 PM


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: JerryArkansas on November 23, 2014, 08:56:34 PM
As I am not a member of the commission I will be playing the role of an interest group's representative who will be relentlessly hounding the commissioners (the interest group in question will depend on the state)
As will I.  If you guys do go for VA, I call the NAACP.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Sol on November 23, 2014, 09:28:44 PM
Interested in being a lobbyist of some sort too. And I say Wisconsin.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 24, 2014, 12:55:57 AM
Great to see so many lobsters. They'll get to submit their plans to the commission, too.

Once the state is selected (yes it's still tied by my count), the commission will have to vote on the criteria to produce a map.

My thoughts on commission votes is that it takes 3 votes to pass the commission. The alternates may vote, but their votes will only count if one or two commissioners fails to vote on a matter before the commission. In the spirit of crowdsourcing the final product, other posters may urge the commission to vote in a particular way during the discussion/voting period. Commissioners can vote at any time during the discussion/voting period and the vote can be changed, with only the last vote counted.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: morgieb on November 24, 2014, 01:05:57 AM
In favour of Virginia fwiw.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Del Tachi on November 24, 2014, 01:51:45 PM
Let's do Virginia


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Bacon King on November 24, 2014, 03:40:34 PM
Since it appears to be close to a consensus, I'll change my earlier vote to just Virginia


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Miles on November 25, 2014, 01:25:24 AM
^ Commissioner Miles agrees with the format criteria Muon described for Item I.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: publicunofficial on November 25, 2014, 01:59:42 AM
Seems like a fair format to me.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: morgieb on November 25, 2014, 02:09:33 AM
Yeah sounds pretty solid.

I'll get cracking soon enough with a draft for Virginia.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: publicunofficial on November 25, 2014, 03:30:52 AM
Here's my initial Virginia map.

() (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Statewide_zps7467e414.png.html)
() (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Richmond_zps0c37c534.png.html)
() (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Norfolk-VirginiaBeach_zps3dd44562.png.html)
() (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/NOVA_zpsf13ffc12.png.html)


District 1 (Blue)
  • Deviation: 290
  • Election 2008: John McCain - 54.4%, Barack Obama - 44.7%
  • Racial Breakdown: 73% White, 15.3% Black, 6.2% Hispanic

District 2 (Green)
  • Deviation: -422
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 49.8%, John McCain - 49.4%
  • Racial Breakdown: 62.6% White, 23.3% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

District 3 (Purple)
  • Deviation: -30
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 64%, John McCain - 35.2%
  • Racial Breakdown: 48.8% White, 35.2% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

District 4 (Red)
  • Deviation: 83
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 67.6%, John McCain - 31.7%
  • Racial Breakdown: 51.8% Black, 39.3% White, 5.2% Hispanic

District 5 (Yellow)
  • Deviation: -903
  • Election 2008: John McCain - 51.2%, Barack Obama - 47.8%
  • Racial Breakdown: 71.7% White, 21.5% Black

District 6 (Teal)
  • Deviation: 586
  • Election 2008: John McCain - 56.4%, Barack Obama - 42.5%
  • Racial Breakdown: 83.9% White, 7.9% Black, 5.1% Hispanic

District 7 (Silver)
  • Deviation: 352
  • Election 2008: John McCain - 57.9%, Barack Obama - 41.3%
  • Racial Breakdown: 76.2% White, 13.1% Black

District 8 (Slate Blue)
  • Deviation: 384
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 68.2%, John McCain - 30.9%
  • Racial Breakdown: 52.8% White, 12.9% Black, 18.2% Hispanic 19.7%, 11.5% Asian

District 9 (Light Blue)
  • Deviation: 501
  • Election 2008: John McCain - 59.5%, Barack Obama - 39.1%
  • Racial Breakdown: 91.8% White

District 10 (Pink)
  • Deviation: -219
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 57.4%, John McCain - 41.9%
  • Racial Breakdown: 61.4% White, 6.2% Black, 11.6% Hispanic, 17.3% Asian

District 11 (Light Green)
  • Deviation: -624
  • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 58%, John McCain - 41.3%
  • Racial Breakdown: 51.3% White, 14.8% Black, 18.2% Hispanic, 12% Asian


Things I like about my map:
-District 6 is pretty much just Shenandoah Valley + Roanoke, making a very clean CoI
-Clean Majority-Minority district (VA-03), along with a black majority district (VA-04)
-Very few splits around Virginia Beach/Norfolk/Newport area. Most maps I've seen cut this area to shreds.
-5 Solid Democratic districts, 4 Solid Republican districts, 2 competitive Districts (VA-02 and VA-05)

Dislikes:
-I'd like to keep Richmond whole, but doing so would force multiple splits around Chesapeake Bay in order to form a majority-black district.
-More county splits than probably necessary.[/list]


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 25, 2014, 03:46:50 AM
Fuzzy approves.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: morgieb on November 25, 2014, 04:53:35 AM
I'll make my own map later, but that looks fairly sweet.


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 07:52:38 AM

Is this your vote? If so, are you voting on all three items before the commission?


Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 08:11:08 AM
    Here's my initial Virginia map.

    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Statewide_zps7467e414.png.html)
    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Richmond_zps0c37c534.png.html)
    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Norfolk-VirginiaBeach_zps3dd44562.png.html)
    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/NOVA_zpsf13ffc12.png.html)


    District 1 (Blue)
    • Deviation: 290
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 54.4%, Barack Obama - 44.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 73% White, 15.3% Black, 6.2% Hispanic

    District 2 (Green)
    • Deviation: -422
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 49.8%, John McCain - 49.4%
    • Racial Breakdown: 62.6% White, 23.3% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 3 (Purple)
    • Deviation: -30
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 64%, John McCain - 35.2%
    • Racial Breakdown: 48.8% White, 35.2% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 4 (Red)
    • Deviation: 83
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 67.6%, John McCain - 31.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.8% Black, 39.3% White, 5.2% Hispanic

    District 5 (Yellow)
    • Deviation: -903
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 51.2%, Barack Obama - 47.8%
    • Racial Breakdown: 71.7% White, 21.5% Black

    District 6 (Teal)
    • Deviation: 586
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 56.4%, Barack Obama - 42.5%
    • Racial Breakdown: 83.9% White, 7.9% Black, 5.1% Hispanic

    District 7 (Silver)
    • Deviation: 352
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 57.9%, Barack Obama - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 76.2% White, 13.1% Black

    District 8 (Slate Blue)
    • Deviation: 384
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 68.2%, John McCain - 30.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 52.8% White, 12.9% Black, 18.2% Hispanic 19.7%, 11.5% Asian

    District 9 (Light Blue)
    • Deviation: 501
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 59.5%, Barack Obama - 39.1%
    • Racial Breakdown: 91.8% White

    District 10 (Pink)
    • Deviation: -219
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 57.4%, John McCain - 41.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 61.4% White, 6.2% Black, 11.6% Hispanic, 17.3% Asian

    District 11 (Light Green)
    • Deviation: -624
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 58%, John McCain - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.3% White, 14.8% Black, 18.2% Hispanic, 12% Asian


    Things I like about my map:
    -District 6 is pretty much just Shenandoah Valley + Roanoke, making a very clean CoI
    -Clean Majority-Minority district (VA-03), along with a black majority district (VA-04)
    -Very few splits around Virginia Beach/Norfolk/Newport area. Most maps I've seen cut this area to shreds.
    -5 Solid Democratic districts, 4 Solid Republican districts, 2 competitive Districts (VA-02 and VA-05)

    Dislikes:
    -I'd like to keep Richmond whole, but doing so would force multiple splits around Chesapeake Bay in order to form a majority-black district.
    -More county splits than probably necessary.[/list]

    Nice work, particularly describing your pros and cons. Some of those, like county chops, should become quantified once the scoring system is approved. Normally a commission wouldn't take submissions until all the rules are approved, but in a crowdsourcing environment, submissions will happen as soon as web links are up. However, if item 1 is adopted, you'll need to resubmit your detail maps with City/Town lines turned on to be considered by the commission. Chops of municipalities within counties will be proposed as part of the measures, so they need to be assessed.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on November 25, 2014, 10:23:51 AM
    Muon2, are you going to use the state highway chop count as a proxy to measure erosity? Do highway chops within chopped counties count for this category?  Is there going to be some pareto optimality metric?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 10:48:02 AM
    Muon2, are you going to use the state highway chop count as a proxy to measure erosity? Do highway chops within chopped counties count for this category?  Is there going to be some pareto optimality metric?

    The Pareto optimality provision is embodied in item 3 above. It accepts all maps that are on the Pareto frontier defined by chop and erosity scores. Inequality is used to reduce the number of maps that would be at the same point on the frontier.

    I have spent a bit of time analyzing my earlier work on erosity. At the county level, I will propose the cut set of state highways that we have looked at before. I have some suggested refinements for mega-chopped counties such as Fairfax so that erosity is reduced in heavily populated areas where state highways are no longer the best metric. There will also be some discussion about what constitutes connectivity in the Hampton Roads area and I'm working on a primer to facilitate that. There may also be some amendments proposed to deal with independent cities that were forced by statute to take over some of their state highways.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 25, 2014, 11:22:43 AM
    I approve of the three items; and commend the excellent work on the part of angrygreatness!  Btw, Electionsguy should probably be added to the commission since I believe Dixie (a Republican commissioner) said he was leaving the forum permanently last night.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 03:12:32 PM
    I approve of the three items; and commend the excellent work on the part of angrygreatness!  Btw, Electionsguy should probably be added to the commission since I believe Dixie (a Republican commissioner) said he was leaving the forum permanently last night.

    I see Dixie has just posted a departure thread on FC, so that would seem to confirm your statement. Unless I hear otherwise in the next day, I will replace Dixie. That moves ElectionsGuy onto the commission and you (X) to first alternate. I've drawn SLCValleyMan as the new second alternate.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 25, 2014, 06:23:39 PM
    Here's my initial Virginia map.

    District 1 (Blue)
    • Deviation: 290
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 54.4%, Barack Obama - 44.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 73% White, 15.3% Black, 6.2% Hispanic

    District 2 (Green)
    • Deviation: -422
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 49.8%, John McCain - 49.4%
    • Racial Breakdown: 62.6% White, 23.3% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 3 (Purple)
    • Deviation: -30
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 64%, John McCain - 35.2%
    • Racial Breakdown: 48.8% White, 35.2% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 4 (Red)
    • Deviation: 83
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 67.6%, John McCain - 31.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.8% Black, 39.3% White, 5.2% Hispanic

    District 5 (Yellow)
    • Deviation: -903
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 51.2%, Barack Obama - 47.8%
    • Racial Breakdown: 71.7% White, 21.5% Black

    District 6 (Teal)
    • Deviation: 586
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 56.4%, Barack Obama - 42.5%
    • Racial Breakdown: 83.9% White, 7.9% Black, 5.1% Hispanic

    District 7 (Silver)
    • Deviation: 352
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 57.9%, Barack Obama - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 76.2% White, 13.1% Black

    District 8 (Slate Blue)
    • Deviation: 384
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 68.2%, John McCain - 30.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 52.8% White, 12.9% Black, 18.2% Hispanic 19.7%, 11.5% Asian

    District 9 (Light Blue)
    • Deviation: 501
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 59.5%, Barack Obama - 39.1%
    • Racial Breakdown: 91.8% White

    District 10 (Pink)
    • Deviation: -219
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 57.4%, John McCain - 41.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 61.4% White, 6.2% Black, 11.6% Hispanic, 17.3% Asian

    District 11 (Light Green)
    • Deviation: -624
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 58%, John McCain - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.3% White, 14.8% Black, 18.2% Hispanic, 12% Asian

    -Clean Majority-Minority district (VA-03), along with a black majority district (VA-04)

    Why don't your racial percentages don't total to 100%?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 25, 2014, 06:30:18 PM
    Here's my initial Virginia map.

    District 1 (Blue)
    • Deviation: 290
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 54.4%, Barack Obama - 44.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 73% White, 15.3% Black, 6.2% Hispanic

    District 2 (Green)
    • Deviation: -422
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 49.8%, John McCain - 49.4%
    • Racial Breakdown: 62.6% White, 23.3% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 3 (Purple)
    • Deviation: -30
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 64%, John McCain - 35.2%
    • Racial Breakdown: 48.8% White, 35.2% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 4 (Red)
    • Deviation: 83
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 67.6%, John McCain - 31.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.8% Black, 39.3% White, 5.2% Hispanic

    District 5 (Yellow)
    • Deviation: -903
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 51.2%, Barack Obama - 47.8%
    • Racial Breakdown: 71.7% White, 21.5% Black

    District 6 (Teal)
    • Deviation: 586
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 56.4%, Barack Obama - 42.5%
    • Racial Breakdown: 83.9% White, 7.9% Black, 5.1% Hispanic

    District 7 (Silver)
    • Deviation: 352
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 57.9%, Barack Obama - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 76.2% White, 13.1% Black

    District 8 (Slate Blue)
    • Deviation: 384
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 68.2%, John McCain - 30.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 52.8% White, 12.9% Black, 18.2% Hispanic 19.7%, 11.5% Asian

    District 9 (Light Blue)
    • Deviation: 501
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 59.5%, Barack Obama - 39.1%
    • Racial Breakdown: 91.8% White

    District 10 (Pink)
    • Deviation: -219
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 57.4%, John McCain - 41.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 61.4% White, 6.2% Black, 11.6% Hispanic, 17.3% Asian

    District 11 (Light Green)
    • Deviation: -624
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 58%, John McCain - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.3% White, 14.8% Black, 18.2% Hispanic, 12% Asian

    -Clean Majority-Minority district (VA-03), along with a black majority district (VA-04)

    Why don't your racial percentages don't total to 100%?


    He's probably leaving out groups that account for less than 5% of the districts' populations'.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on November 25, 2014, 07:07:11 PM
    My submission for VA. My CD3 is 50.6% BVAP

    ()

    ()

    ()
    ()


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on November 25, 2014, 07:58:06 PM
    Muon2, are you going to use the state highway chop count as a proxy to measure erosity? Do highway chops within chopped counties count for this category?  Is there going to be some pareto optimality metric?

    Thank you. I look forward to your thoughts on intra county chops. Pity I got deflected from our project. In my semi retirement there are just not enough hours in the day, and now I have Hudson on my mind.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 10:46:41 PM
    I just want to remind the commissioners (and alternates) to vote on the three items before them. I'll continue with detailed implementation items after this basic outline is agreed to.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 10:49:27 PM
    My submission for VA. My CD3 is 50.6% BVAP

    ()

    ()

    ()
    ()

    How did you get the Warner-Gillespie numbers for the CDs with chopped counties/cities?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on November 25, 2014, 10:55:18 PM
    ^ The Virginia Public Access Project has precinct-level results. (http://www.vpap.org/elections/live_results/nov_2014)


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on November 25, 2014, 11:02:58 PM
    Also, I did the 2013 Governor's race, but forgot to save my work. I remember the rough breakdowns being something like this:

    1- 49/44 Cuccinelli
    2- 50/44 McAuliffe
    3- 69/25 M
    4- 47/46 C
    5- 52/42 C
    6- 57/35 C
    7- 50/41 C
    8- 68/26 M
    9- 62/32 C
    10- 50/45 C
    11- 57/38 M


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 25, 2014, 11:33:22 PM
    ^ The Virginia Public Access Project has precinct-level results. (http://www.vpap.org/elections/live_results/nov_2014)

    Very nice. Of course it helps that VA doesn't have too many precincts. It looks like my county of less than 1 million has more precincts than the whole state of VA.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on November 26, 2014, 12:09:52 AM
    Virginia's popping up with errors for me for some reason...so help?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on November 26, 2014, 12:17:35 AM
    ^ Is this better? (http://i1132.photobucket.com/albums/m576/MilesC56/vanew_zps233dbee0.png)


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on November 26, 2014, 05:31:32 AM
    I approve of all three items, btw. 


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Del Tachi on November 26, 2014, 12:11:56 PM


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 26, 2014, 11:44:27 PM
    To illustrate the above items 4 and 5, I will apply them to angryGreatness-A (I'll use letters to designate different plans from the same poster).

    District 1 (Blue)
    • Deviation: 290
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 54.4%, Barack Obama - 44.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 73% White, 15.3% Black, 6.2% Hispanic

    District 2 (Green)
    • Deviation: -422
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 49.8%, John McCain - 49.4%
    • Racial Breakdown: 62.6% White, 23.3% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 3 (Purple)
    • Deviation: -30
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 64%, John McCain - 35.2%
    • Racial Breakdown: 48.8% White, 35.2% Black, 5.9% Hispanic

    District 4 (Red)
    • Deviation: 83
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 67.6%, John McCain - 31.7%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.8% Black, 39.3% White, 5.2% Hispanic

    District 5 (Yellow)
    • Deviation: -903
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 51.2%, Barack Obama - 47.8%
    • Racial Breakdown: 71.7% White, 21.5% Black

    District 6 (Teal)
    • Deviation: 586
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 56.4%, Barack Obama - 42.5%
    • Racial Breakdown: 83.9% White, 7.9% Black, 5.1% Hispanic

    District 7 (Silver)
    • Deviation: 352
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 57.9%, Barack Obama - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 76.2% White, 13.1% Black

    District 8 (Slate Blue)
    • Deviation: 384
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 68.2%, John McCain - 30.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 52.8% White, 12.9% Black, 18.2% Hispanic 19.7%, 11.5% Asian

    District 9 (Light Blue)
    • Deviation: 501
    • Election 2008: John McCain - 59.5%, Barack Obama - 39.1%
    • Racial Breakdown: 91.8% White

    District 10 (Pink)
    • Deviation: -219
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 57.4%, John McCain - 41.9%
    • Racial Breakdown: 61.4% White, 6.2% Black, 11.6% Hispanic, 17.3% Asian

    District 11 (Light Green)
    • Deviation: -624
    • Election 2008: Barack Obama - 58%, John McCain - 41.3%
    • Racial Breakdown: 51.3% White, 14.8% Black, 18.2% Hispanic, 12% Asian

    CD-01: PVI-08=-8.6; uncompetitive R
    CD-02: PVI-08=-3.5; competitive R
    CD-03: PVI-08=+10.8; uncompetitive D
    CD-04: PVI-08=+14.4; uncompetitive D
    CD-05: PVI-08=-5.4; competitive R
    CD-06: PVI-08=-10.7; uncompetitive R
    CD-07: PVI-08=-12.1; uncompetitive R
    CD-08: PVI-08=+15.1; uncompetitive D
    CD-09: PVI-08=-14.0; uncompetitive R
    CD-10: PVI-08=+4.1; competitive D
    CD-11: PVI-08=+4.7; competitive D

    SKEW: +5-6 = -1; S score 1 (R)
    POLARIZATION: 4+2*7 = 18; P score 18


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on November 26, 2014, 11:46:36 PM
    I voted for all 3 items FWIW.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 27, 2014, 08:40:47 AM
    For comparison, here are the political measures for Miles-A. For shorthand I use D and R for uncompetitive districts, d and r for competitive districts, and e for highly competitive districts. In order they are r,e,D,r,r,R,R,D,R,r,d or 2D, 1d, 1e, 4r, 3R. That gives S = 4 (R), P = 15.



    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on November 27, 2014, 02:45:06 PM
    "A competitive district has a PVI of 2 through 5 (-0.054 to -0.015 and +0.015 to 0.054) and statistically such districts have an 3 out of 4 chance of being held by the favored party."

    That seems like a very wide range to me, with 1.5 to 2.5 quite competitive, and 4-5 not much, although I suppose an examination of results in the past would be instructive. In my brain, once you hit 4, a seat is pretty safe absent unusual developments, or a significant trend going on. Is there an advantage in bifurcating this category, and adjusting the point count some?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 27, 2014, 04:22:57 PM
    "A competitive district has a PVI of 2 through 5 (-0.054 to -0.015 and +0.015 to 0.054) and statistically such districts have an 3 out of 4 chance of being held by the favored party."

    That seems like a very wide range to me, with 1.5 to 2.5 quite competitive, and 4-5 not much, although I suppose an examination of results in the past would be instructive. In my brain, once you hit 4, a seat is pretty safe absent unusual developments, or a significant trend going on. Is there an advantage in bifurcating this category, and adjusting the point count some?

    There was a 538 analysis some time ago and it matched the Cook use of PVI 5 or less as a "swing" seat. Statistically there's not as much difference between PVI 2 and PVI 4 as you might think. I could've made a fancy linear fit to the data so that the scale slides for all PVI's, but I couldn't find that it really adds anything. There's a tendency to micro-manage the statistics like when 538 says that a seat has moved from 66% R to 70% R. Mathematically it's correct, but given the statistical uncertainty of the input polls, it's not a meaningful change. If I can find the data set again I'll supply a link.

    OTOH, there's a more meaningful issue inside the measure for SKEW that the commission may want to consider. If you look at the two maps I scored, you'll see that Miles-A is a more competitive plan than angryGreatness-A. However, that came at the expense of a Pub skew to Miles map. If the commission wants to reward competitiveness more, I would adjust SKEW so that uncompetitive districts only count twice as much as competitive districts. That would have no effect on angryGreatness-A since there are equal numbers of competitive d and r districts, but it would reduce the relative SKEW of Miles-A in comparison.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 27, 2014, 07:49:37 PM
    ()

    This is based on maintaining Urban County Clusters, and limiting the splitting of counties.  As I had done for the UCC definition, I used the original counties, subject to annexations of independent cities into adjoining counties.

    For that purpose - the following pairings are used: Lynchburg-Campbell County, Galax-Carroll County, Radford-Montgomery County, Alexandria-Arlington County, Falls Church-Fairfax-Fairfax County, Fredericksburg-Spotsylvania County, Richmond-Henrico County, Dinwiddie-Petersburg, Colonial Heights-Chesterfield County, Hopewell-Prince George County, Franklin-Southampton County, Williamsburg-James City County, Poquoson-York County, Norfolk-Portsmouth-Cheasapeake (Norfolk County).

    Newport News, Hampton, Virgnia Beach, have annexed the entirety of their original counties of Warwick, Elizabeth City, Princess Anne, and Nasemond counties, respectively.

    There are 3 large UCC's in Virginia that cover multiple counties, Washington (NOVA), Richmond, and Hampton Roads.  Each requires more than one congressional district.

    The three large UCC's isolate the area along the James, York, Rappahannock, and Potomac Rivers.  Shifting the southern extension of the Washington UCC (Stafford, Fredericksburg IC, Spotsylvania) to this district along with James City and York from the Hampton Roads UCC, and wrapping around the Richmond UCC got the necessary population.

    The remainder of the Washington UCC had a population of 3.067, and I considered using a maximum deviation of 2.5%.

    Adding in the two Delmarva counties, put the Hampton Roads area at 1.996.  I had considered going across Cheasapeake Bay, but this would not get better population equality.

    The Richmond UCC had a population equivalent to about 1.5 CD so I kept adding into the Southside until there was enough population for two districts.

    I then drew the three western districts.  It turned out that the last only had a population of 0.927.   I had a large surplus in the Washington area, but did not systematically create a deficit elsewhere, and the deficit ended up in one district.  Arguably, the 3-district Washington area with its deviation of 0.067 had a systematic error, since it would have required all 3 districts to be close to the 2.5% limit.   Combining the 3-district area with the northern area gives a population of 3.994.

    Shifting a few counties resulted in all 6 regions within 1%, including the multi-district regions.

    I then noticed that the Fairfax County-Arlington County-Fairfax-Falls Church-Alexandria area had a population of 2.013, and the remainder 1.981.   This will permit creation of four districts within 1% error.

    This will require a single split of Fairfax County, rather than two, and chopping off a chunk of Loudoun or Prince William counties.

    In the Hampton Roads area, there will likely be a split of Norfolk, with most of the city added to Newport News-Hampton-Portsmouth, and the other district wrapping around south of Nortfolk and Portsmouth.

    A case could be made that the split of York County and Poquoson is a chop.

    A split of Chesterfield County is likely necessary in the Richmond area.  The total population of Chesterfield County-Henrico County-Richmond is 1.138, and trying to reach around from Richmond to south of the James, displaces other districts.  Splitting Chesterfield will keep the Southside district somewhat remote from Richmond.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: publicunofficial on November 28, 2014, 12:59:41 AM
    Now with city lines

    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/NOVAwithcities_zpsf77a38aa.png.html)
    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Richmondwithcities_zps6a0574e0.png.html)
    () (http://s46.photobucket.com/user/James_Root/media/Norfolk-VirginiaBeachwithcities_zps5dd38967.png.html)


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Sol on November 28, 2014, 09:59:19 AM
    As an interest group representative from the Shenandoah Valley, I would like to express my opinion of the various preceding maps.

    AngryGreatness: Excellent! Your teal district keeps the Shenandoah Valley whole and together, and it will surely elect a true local representative. Someone from the Roanoke metro may not like it as much, however.

    Miles: I can't see yours because of school blocks. :P

    Jimrtex: Your plan slices and dices the natural community of interest in NW Virginia. It is unacceptable.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 28, 2014, 10:52:10 AM
    To aid people who are already working on maps and are looking at chopping Richmond to comply with the VRA, here is a map of the city divided into five areas based on the generally accepted groupings of neighborhoods. The boundaries are adjusted to conform with the voting districts in DRA.

    ()

    Blue - Downtown; pop 11,816; BVAP 30.7%
    Green - East End; pop 27,084; BVAP 71.1%
    Purple - Northside; pop 32,018; BVAP 69.2%
    Red - West End; pop 49,504; BVAP 14.2%
    Yellow - Southside; pop 83,792; BVAP 54.4%


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on November 28, 2014, 10:30:11 PM

    Miles: I can't see yours because of school blocks. :P

    Can you see this?

    ()


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 29, 2014, 04:08:32 AM
    Initial Submission

    ()

    There are four split counties/independent cities: Cheasapeake city; Chesterfield County; Fairfax County; and Loudoun County.   The split of Fairfax County is necessary because of its size.  The others are reasonable because they help confine districts to urban areas.


    Newport News-Hampton-Poquoson-Portsmouth-Norfolk is about 8% short of a CD, so I added the South Norfolk area of Cheasapeake IC.  Norfolk and Portsmouth were both formed from Norfolk County.  The independent city of South Norfolk was created in 1921.  In 1963 South Norfolk and the remainder of Norfolk County merged to form the city of Cheasapeake.

    The area included in the VA-10 is generally inside the Hampton Roads Beltway (I-64).

    ()

    The area of Chesapeake placed in VA-10 is 27.7% of the city, 8.4% of the CD, it is slightly more Black than the CD as a whole (42.5% vs 41.6%), and slightly less Obama-supporting (66.2% vs 67.6%)


    CD Population CD Pop. % County % CD    White   Black   Hisp.  Asian  AIAN   Other  2-way  Obama    McCain
    10    61549   730192   27.7%    8.4%   48.8%   42.5%   5.1%   1.7%   0.4%   1.6%   27241   66.2%   33.8%
    11   160660   728792   72.3%   22.0%   67.8%   23.6%   3.2%   3.5%   0.3%   1.6%   79378   45.3%   54.7%
         222209           100.0%           62.5%   28.8%   3.7%   3.0%   0.3%   1.6%  106619   50.6%   49.4%


    Henrico-Hanover-Richmond is about 16% short of a CD.   The area added from Chesterfield County generally extends outward from the part of Richmond south of the James River.

    ()

    VA-5 includes Arlington County, Alexandria, Falls Church, and the east part of Fairfax County, generally south of Washington, as opposed to west of Washington.

    The area included is generally inside the Beltway, except on the west in the McLean area, or east of I-95 southward along the Potomac.   The western boundary is generally Lorton-Newington-Springfield-Annandale-Jefferson-Falls Church-Arlington County.

    ()

    Loudoun plus Prince William (including Manassas and Manassas Park) have an excess of 5.4%.  The 13 county area to the south has a deficit of 7.3% (for a collective deficit of 1.9%).   Splitting the difference, an area with about 6.4% of CD needs to be split off.   This is roughly 15% of the total population of Loudoun County.

    The area detached Loudoun County is in the less developed portion of the county, west of US-15 and Leesburg.

    ()

    Statistics (right click, view image to make readable size).

    ()

    Population Equality

    Mean Absolute Deviation: 0.61%; Standard Deviation 0.65%; Range 1.76%.

    Political:

    Republican Uncompetitive (5): 1, 2, 3, 7, 9.
    Republican Competitive (1): 11
    Even (0):
    Democratic Competitive (3): 4, 6, 8
    Democratic Uncompetitive (2): 5, 10

    Skew: Statewide(0) - Republican(6) + Democratic(5) = -1
    Polarization: Even(0)*0 + Competitive(4)*1 + Uncompetitive(7)*2 = 18


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 29, 2014, 11:56:18 AM
    A gentle reminder to the commission that Items 4 and 5 are awaiting action and discussion. In particular I noted a possible amendment to Item 4 that may be worth discussion.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 29, 2014, 09:13:08 PM
    Is there a way to get county splits in DRA?

    I was going to increase the number of CDs, then color the extra "CDs" for the county parts.  This should give me demographic and political data for the split county parts.

    But when I increment the number of districts, all the existing districts disappear.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 29, 2014, 10:03:47 PM
    Is there a way to get county splits in DRA?

    I was going to increase the number of CDs, then color the extra "CDs" for the county parts.  This should give me demographic and political data for the split county parts.

    But when I increment the number of districts, all the existing districts disappear.

    Unfortunately no. The best I've found is to either reserve many additional districts and keep track of the real quota on my own spreadsheet, or to make a number of separate DRA files after the fact to highlight the chops.

    There is one shortcut to all this that I've used quite effectively. Once the map is complete, I double check with the Find Unassigned Dists tool. After everything is assigned I can unassign any county fragment and look at the demographics of both the fragment and the remaining district. It can be time consuming for a lot of fragments, but it avoids clearing the original map.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 29, 2014, 10:35:39 PM
    Is there a way to get county splits in DRA?

    I was going to increase the number of CDs, then color the extra "CDs" for the county parts.  This should give me demographic and political data for the split county parts.

    But when I increment the number of districts, all the existing districts disappear.

    Unfortunately no. The best I've found is to either reserve many additional districts and keep track of the real quota on my own spreadsheet, or to make a number of separate DRA files after the fact to highlight the chops.

    There is one shortcut to all this that I've used quite effectively. Once the map is complete, I double check with the Find Unassigned Dists tool. After everything is assigned I can unassign any county fragment and look at the demographics of both the fragment and the remaining district. It can be time consuming for a lot of fragments, but it avoids clearing the original map.
    I figured out a way.

    Under file: Save VTD data as CSV,

    This creates a CSV file.   For each VTD, there is the Census ID, District Assignment, VTD name, and County (or City), followed by the demographic and political data for the VTD.

    I calculated my statistics for my CDs from the similar Save CD data as CSV.   It would seem useful to have people submit the CD CSV file to you, or maybe set up something on Google apps.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 30, 2014, 07:52:54 AM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on November 30, 2014, 09:05:56 AM
    I vote for Item 4 and 5. Although, I suppose in some cases strong skews/polarisation isn't really avoidable. I don't really like gerrymanders for competitiveness.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 30, 2014, 01:04:36 PM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.
    If the Virginia commission were operating under the terms of the Florida constitution, items 4 and 5 would be outlawed since they are politically-based.

    The current litigation in Florida was whether or not the legislature was indirectly influenced to make political decisions.   The problem in Florida is that the legislature is a political body, and you would hope that they would be susceptible to political arguments.

    In Britain, where the boundary commissions are independent, public representations by political parties are quite acceptable and ordinary, but they have to be cast in terms that the commission can recognize, such as communities of interest.

    I would suggest that items 4 and 5 not be used directly by the commission, but that we (the forum community) use them as metrics for the process as a whole.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on November 30, 2014, 01:29:08 PM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.
    If the Virginia commission were operating under the terms of the Florida constitution, items 4 and 5 would be outlawed since they are politically-based.

    The current litigation in Florida was whether or not the legislature was indirectly influenced to make political decisions.   The problem in Florida is that the legislature is a political body, and you would hope that they would be susceptible to political arguments.

    In Britain, where the boundary commissions are independent, public representations by political parties are quite acceptable and ordinary, but they have to be cast in terms that the commission can recognize, such as communities of interest.

    I would suggest that items 4 and 5 not be used directly by the commission, but that we (the forum community) use them as metrics for the process as a whole.

    I included them as measures since political data is explicitly required by the AZ commission and were part of the proposal for an OH commission. Good government groups I've spoken with are divided as to the need to use or forbid the use of the political measures of a plan. Personally, I think that clever mappers will find a way to gain a political advantage even with extensive neutral rules (see MI). Political measures provide one means to determine if the rules have been gamed.

    However, it is because of the political nature of this data that I placed SKEW and POLARIZATION as after-the-fact measures in Item 3. They can not be used to exclude a plan, but can be used to guide the commission's final selection. I also believe that commissioners will have inherent biases towards certain plans and the political data simply provides a check on those inherent biases.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on November 30, 2014, 02:10:47 PM
    I vote for items four and five


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on November 30, 2014, 11:36:20 PM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.
    If the Virginia commission were operating under the terms of the Florida constitution, items 4 and 5 would be outlawed since they are politically-based.

    The current litigation in Florida was whether or not the legislature was indirectly influenced to make political decisions.   The problem in Florida is that the legislature is a political body, and you would hope that they would be susceptible to political arguments.

    In Britain, where the boundary commissions are independent, public representations by political parties are quite acceptable and ordinary, but they have to be cast in terms that the commission can recognize, such as communities of interest.

    I would suggest that items 4 and 5 not be used directly by the commission, but that we (the forum community) use them as metrics for the process as a whole.

    I included them as measures since political data is explicitly required by the AZ commission and were part of the proposal for an OH commission. Good government groups I've spoken with are divided as to the need to use or forbid the use of the political measures of a plan. Personally, I think that clever mappers will find a way to gain a political advantage even with extensive neutral rules (see MI). Political measures provide one means to determine if the rules have been gamed.

    However, it is because of the political nature of this data that I placed SKEW and POLARIZATION as after-the-fact measures in Item 3. They can not be used to exclude a plan, but can be used to guide the commission's final selection. I also believe that commissioners will have inherent biases towards certain plans and the political data simply provides a check on those inherent biases.
    In Arizona, the use of the rule may have led to skewing of the results.  With so much of the population in a few counties, it is unlikely that but for that measure the competitive seats would tend to be underpopulated.

    And it may be contrary to good representation.   Putting Cuyahoga and Holmes counties into a single district does not lead to good representative, even if it somehow led to a competitive race.  The representative can not be representative of the district, nor effectively represent the district since its interests are so disparate.  The initial redistricting initiative in Ohio may have failed because of the maps  that were produced showing you can get a long way from Cleveland without splitting counties.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 01, 2014, 02:00:15 AM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.
    If the Virginia commission were operating under the terms of the Florida constitution, items 4 and 5 would be outlawed since they are politically-based.

    The current litigation in Florida was whether or not the legislature was indirectly influenced to make political decisions.   The problem in Florida is that the legislature is a political body, and you would hope that they would be susceptible to political arguments.

    In Britain, where the boundary commissions are independent, public representations by political parties are quite acceptable and ordinary, but they have to be cast in terms that the commission can recognize, such as communities of interest.

    I would suggest that items 4 and 5 not be used directly by the commission, but that we (the forum community) use them as metrics for the process as a whole.

    I included them as measures since political data is explicitly required by the AZ commission and were part of the proposal for an OH commission. Good government groups I've spoken with are divided as to the need to use or forbid the use of the political measures of a plan. Personally, I think that clever mappers will find a way to gain a political advantage even with extensive neutral rules (see MI). Political measures provide one means to determine if the rules have been gamed.

    However, it is because of the political nature of this data that I placed SKEW and POLARIZATION as after-the-fact measures in Item 3. They can not be used to exclude a plan, but can be used to guide the commission's final selection. I also believe that commissioners will have inherent biases towards certain plans and the political data simply provides a check on those inherent biases.
    In Arizona, the use of the rule may have led to skewing of the results.  With so much of the population in a few counties, it is unlikely that but for that measure the competitive seats would tend to be underpopulated.

    And it may be contrary to good representation.   Putting Cuyahoga and Holmes counties into a single district does not lead to good representative, even if it somehow led to a competitive race.  The representative can not be representative of the district, nor effectively represent the district since its interests are so disparate.  The initial redistricting initiative in Ohio may have failed because of the maps  that were produced showing you can get a long way from Cleveland without splitting counties.

    AZ suffered from the mandate of competitiveness, not its inclusion. Since the commission was compelled to maximize the number of competitive districts, they were sensitive to a data set that was prone to skew their resulting districts. The maps produced by the opponents of the 2005 OH initiative also used the maximization of competitive districts to get strange results. The competing initiatives in 2010 which did not reach the ballot used political data as part of a mix of factors and did not prioritize it in a way that was likely to warp the final plan.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 01, 2014, 10:15:42 AM
    Since no commissioners have weighed in on the items before the commission, I'm not sure how to proceed. The process will drag out, and there will probably be a lack of interest if things don't keep moving. Commissioners morgieb, Miles, Del Tachi, and ElectionsGuy have all posted to the Atlas since Items 4 and 5 were posted, but not on those items. Only Fuzzybigfoot has been off since 11/26, and that's why there are two alternates: X and SLCValleyMan. Any feedback into how to get this on track is welcomed.
    If the Virginia commission were operating under the terms of the Florida constitution, items 4 and 5 would be outlawed since they are politically-based.

    The current litigation in Florida was whether or not the legislature was indirectly influenced to make political decisions.   The problem in Florida is that the legislature is a political body, and you would hope that they would be susceptible to political arguments.

    In Britain, where the boundary commissions are independent, public representations by political parties are quite acceptable and ordinary, but they have to be cast in terms that the commission can recognize, such as communities of interest.

    I would suggest that items 4 and 5 not be used directly by the commission, but that we (the forum community) use them as metrics for the process as a whole.

    I included them as measures since political data is explicitly required by the AZ commission and were part of the proposal for an OH commission. Good government groups I've spoken with are divided as to the need to use or forbid the use of the political measures of a plan. Personally, I think that clever mappers will find a way to gain a political advantage even with extensive neutral rules (see MI). Political measures provide one means to determine if the rules have been gamed.

    However, it is because of the political nature of this data that I placed SKEW and POLARIZATION as after-the-fact measures in Item 3. They can not be used to exclude a plan, but can be used to guide the commission's final selection. I also believe that commissioners will have inherent biases towards certain plans and the political data simply provides a check on those inherent biases.
    In Arizona, the use of the rule may have led to skewing of the results.  With so much of the population in a few counties, it is unlikely that but for that measure the competitive seats would tend to be underpopulated.

    And it may be contrary to good representation.   Putting Cuyahoga and Holmes counties into a single district does not lead to good representative, even if it somehow led to a competitive race.  The representative can not be representative of the district, nor effectively represent the district since its interests are so disparate.  The initial redistricting initiative in Ohio may have failed because of the maps  that were produced showing you can get a long way from Cleveland without splitting counties.

    The Ohio thing failed because of the wording of the description Husted forced the measure to use at a point so close to the printing of the ballots that there wasn't time for any sort of legal challenge, IIRC.  He forced it to use wording that left most voters confused about what it would actually do.  I think we can all agree that 99.99% of voters didn't vote for or against that measure because of concerns about what type of district you could draw for Cuyahoga County without splitting counties.  As for Arizona, while the map was basically a pretty fair map.  Four safe Republican seats, two safe Democratic seats, one competitive seat that has a small Democratic tilt, and two competitive seats with a slight Republican tilt seems like about what you'd expect from a fair Arizona map.  It just happened that a fair map benefited Democrats more in Arizona just as it would have benefited Republicans more had their been a truly independent redistricting commission in Illinois. 


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 01, 2014, 12:56:09 PM
    As for Arizona, while the map was basically a pretty fair map.  Four safe Republican seats, two safe Democratic seats, one competitive seat that has a small Democratic tilt, and two competitive seats with a slight Republican tilt seems like about what you'd expect from a fair Arizona map.  It just happened that a fair map benefited Democrats more in Arizona just as it would have benefited Republicans more had their been a truly independent redistricting commission in Illinois. 

    The potential skew in AZ is due to the use of the 2008 data in the PVI's. The Pubs appear to have overperformed there due to McCain as the nominee. Until the data rolls off after the 2016 cycle, it's hard to call swing districts there very accurately. IL has the same problem, and it will be interesting to see the next set of PVI's when non-Obama data replaces 2008.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 01, 2014, 01:20:16 PM
    AZ suffered from the mandate of competitiveness, not its inclusion. Since the commission was compelled to maximize the number of competitive districts, they were sensitive to a data set that was prone to skew their resulting districts. The maps produced by the opponents of the 2005 OH initiative also used the maximization of competitive districts to get strange results. The competing initiatives in 2010 which did not reach the ballot used political data as part of a mix of factors and did not prioritize it in a way that was likely to warp the final plan.
    IIRC, the illustrative map in Ohio was not produced by the opponents.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 01, 2014, 01:36:52 PM
    The Ohio thing failed because of the wording of the description Husted forced the measure to use at a point so close to the printing of the ballots that there wasn't time for any sort of legal challenge, IIRC.  He forced it to use wording that left most voters confused about what it would actually do.  I think we can all agree that 99.99% of voters didn't vote for or against that measure because of concerns about what type of district you could draw for Cuyahoga County without splitting counties.  As for Arizona, while the map was basically a pretty fair map.  Four safe Republican seats, two safe Democratic seats, one competitive seat that has a small Democratic tilt, and two competitive seats with a slight Republican tilt seems like about what you'd expect from a fair Arizona map.  It just happened that a fair map benefited Democrats more in Arizona just as it would have benefited Republicans more had their been a truly independent redistricting commission in Illinois. 
    Husted was not Secretary of State in 2005.

    It failed because the proponents produced a map which had "competitive" districts running across the state.   These maps were published in editorials by newspapers opposing the measure.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 01, 2014, 01:39:01 PM
    The Ohio thing failed because of the wording of the description Husted forced the measure to use at a point so close to the printing of the ballots that there wasn't time for any sort of legal challenge, IIRC.  He forced it to use wording that left most voters confused about what it would actually do.  I think we can all agree that 99.99% of voters didn't vote for or against that measure because of concerns about what type of district you could draw for Cuyahoga County without splitting counties.  As for Arizona, while the map was basically a pretty fair map.  Four safe Republican seats, two safe Democratic seats, one competitive seat that has a small Democratic tilt, and two competitive seats with a slight Republican tilt seems like about what you'd expect from a fair Arizona map.  It just happened that a fair map benefited Democrats more in Arizona just as it would have benefited Republicans more had their been a truly independent redistricting commission in Illinois. 
    Husted was not Secretary of State in 2005.

    It failed because the proponents produced a map which had "competitive" districts running across the state.   These maps were published in editorials by newspapers opposing the measure.

    Ah, we were referring to different redistricting reform measures.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 01, 2014, 07:14:42 PM
    In any case the key issue with competitive districts is to promote a map that is responsive, ie one that allows the voters enough seats to change the partisan make-up of delegations in a way that reflects the opinions of the electorate. Since there is no proportional representation, the danger is a plan that is too effective at separating the parties into uncompetitive districts. There should be some number of competitive seats to protect against that. That's the value of measuring the polarization of a plan.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on December 01, 2014, 09:23:21 PM
    If this helps, here are more results by CD for my plan:

    ()

    ()

    And I made two sets of PVI's; one is the standard version for Presidential races and the other was based on the five statewide races I calculated.

    ()


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 01, 2014, 10:15:43 PM
    If this helps, here are more results by CD for my plan:

    ()

    ()

    And I made two sets of PVI's; one is the standard version for Presidential races and the other was based on the five statewide races I calculated.

    ()

    Very nice, and useful to see that the state results track the presidential results fairly well. BTW, did you want to vote on Items 4 and 5?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on December 01, 2014, 10:19:23 PM
    ^ Oh, yes. I'll support both!


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: traininthedistance on December 02, 2014, 03:20:57 PM
    I have two substantially similar submissions.  The first one minimizes county cuts and polarization; the second one is more compact (and possibly reduces skew?).  In both cases, Tidewater and the west are the same; the difference is merely how to split Loudon/Prince William/Albemarle etc.

    In both cases, District 4 (black portions of Richmond/Tidewater connected via Southside) is the VRA district, at 50.9% Black VAP. Districts 6 and 9 are the same as in Miles' plan; I don't really think it's possible to improve on them given the extent to which they are compact, no-split, low-deviation, and substantially strong CoIs.

    All districts are under 1K deviation in both plans (max deviation just under that line); road connectivity is kept in all cases. Additionally, distinct regions such as Shenandoah Valley and the Northern Neck are kept substantially whole, and I was glad to keep the Tidewater metro within three districts. Splitting the white Richmond suburbs between 1 and 5 is unfortunate; I may yet look for a map that doesn't do that while still maintaining all the other advantages found here.

    Plan 1 minimizes county cuts: the only splits are a) Fairfax, which must be split twice for population purposes*, and b) those associated with the VRA district- Henrico, Richmond, Portsmouth, and Norfolk.  Plan 2 additionally splits Loudon.

    *I tried to split within Fairfax so as to minimize town lines; most of those towns are merely CDPs and do not line up with voting districts, so some CDP split is unavoidable.  For both maps, I also kept all of the associated independent cities together in one of the Fairfax districts, so 11 is literally all-Fairfax. Henrico, of course, has a similar issue.

    Without further ado:

    SUBMISSION 1:

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom11_zpsb4da03ba.jpg.html)

    Tidewater/Richmond:

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom22_zpsef7e3d66.jpg.html)

    NoVA:

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom13_zps7bed7d92.jpg.html)

    And the stats.

    1: 43.4% O / 55.7% M, 40.7% Dem. 75.4% White / 16.1% Black VAP.
    2: 49.5% O / 49.7% M, 46.2% Dem. 65.8% White / 22.1% Black VAP.
    3: 58.7% O / 40.5% M, 53.7% Dem. 57.8% White / 31.2% Black VAP.
    4: 69.1% O / 30.2% M, 63.7% Dem. 42.2% White / 50.9% Black VAP.
    5: 43.1% O / 56.1% M, 40.6% Dem. 70.7% White / 22.6% Black VAP.
    6: 42.1% O / 56.8% M, 40.4% Dem.  Supermajority white.
    7: 53.1% O / 46.1% M, 47.1% Dem. 60.2% White / 17.0% Black / 14.8% Hispanic VAP.
    8: 65.9% O / 33.3% M, 62.0% Dem.  63.3% White / 12.3% Hispanic / 12.8% Asian VAP.
    9: 40.0% O / 58.6% M, 43.3% Dem. Supermajority white.
    10: 52.9% O / 46.7% M, 48.7% Dem. 72.6% White / 11.4% Black VAP.
    11: 60.3% O / 38.9% M, 55.2% Dem. 53.4% White / 10.0% Black / 16.6% Hispanic / 17.6% Asian VAP.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: traininthedistance on December 02, 2014, 03:22:26 PM
    And Submission 2.  Despite the additional county cut, I would consider this to be a better map.

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom21_zpsf73b7cdc.jpg.html)

    Tidewater/Richmond:

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom22_zpsef7e3d66.jpg.html)

    NoVA:

    () (http://s38.photobucket.com/user/petroushkachord/media/vacom23_zpsaa6e1e85.jpg.html)

    Stats:

    1: 43.4% O / 55.7% M, 40.7% Dem. 75.4% White / 16.1% Black VAP.
    2: 49.5% O / 49.7% M, 46.2% Dem. 65.8% White / 22.1% Black VAP.
    3: 58.7% O / 40.5% M, 53.7% Dem. 57.8% White / 31.2% Black VAP.
    4: 69.1% O / 30.2% M, 63.7% Dem. 42.2% White / 50.9% Black VAP.
    5: 43.1% O / 56.1% M, 40.6% Dem. 70.7% White / 22.6% Black VAP.
    6: 42.1% O / 56.8% M, 40.4% Dem.  Supermajority white.
    7: 49.9% O / 49.1% M, 46.7% Dem. 77.3% White / 13.7% Black VAP.
    8: 65.9% O / 33.3% M, 61.9% Dem.  63.1% White / 12.3% Hispanic / 13.0% Asian VAP.
    9: 40.0% O / 58.6% M, 43.3% Dem. Supermajority white.
    10: 56.6% O / 42.7% M, 49.5% Dem. 54.9% White / 14.6% Black / 17.0% Hispanic / 11.0% Asian VAP.
    11: 60.4% O / 38.9% M, 55.3% Dem. 53.6% White / 10.1% Black / 16.6% Hispanic / 17.3% Asian VAP.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Sol on December 02, 2014, 07:45:52 PM
    ()

    Going off of train's map. Hampton Roads and Nova doesn't matter--what I'm focusing on is the center/Richmond.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 02, 2014, 11:35:41 PM
    I will vote for Item 6.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 03, 2014, 04:16:18 AM
    Let's add to the discussion the I in SPICE: Inequality.

    Definition: Quota. The quota is the total population of a state divided by the number of districts rounded to the nearest whole number.
    Definition: Deviation. The deviation is the difference between the population of a district and the quota. Negative numbers indicate a district that has a population that is smaller than the quota.
    Definition: Range. The range is the difference in population between the largest and smallest district in a plan.
    Definition: Average Deviation. The average deviation is the average of the absolute values of the deviations for all districts in a plan.

    Background: SCOTUS has set two different standards for districts. Legislative and local districts must be substantially equal and that has been interpreted to be a range not exceeding 10% of the quota. Congressional districts must be as equal as practicable, and for some time that was assumed to mean that only exact equality would do. However, the recent WV case makes it clear that a range of up to 1% of the quota is acceptable when driven by other neutral redistricting factors. Greater than 1% might also be acceptable, but 10% would presumably not be because that is set by a different standard. It's an evolving area in the law.

    Item 6. All plans must have a range not exceeding 1% of the quota. For VA the quota is 727,366 and the maximum range would be 7,273.

    Background: Some time ago there were some threads that tried to optimize the population equality of districts with no county splits. The result of that exercise was the following graph.

    ()

    Each square represents a state. New England states used towns instead of counties, and states with counties too large for a district assumed that a whole number of counties would nest inside the large county. The more counties available per district, the closer to equality one could achieve, and the relation is logarithmic in population. The green line represents the best fit to the data. Data for average deviation can be fit as well, but the result is not substantially different other than the scale factor that has the average deviation equal to about 1/4 the range.

    The average state has about 72 counties and if one divides that number into 2, 3, 4, etc. districts then one can use the fit from the data in the graph to predict a likely range. That in turn can be built into a table.

    Item 7. The INEQUALITY score for a plan is found by taking the range for a plan and comparing it to the table below.

    RangeInequality
    0-10
    2-101
    11-1002
    101-4003
    401-9004
    901-16005
    1601-24006
    2401-32007
    3201-40008
    4001-48009
    4801-560010
    5601-630011
    6301-700012
    7001-770013



    I'd like discussion/voting to conclude by Friday 12/5 at 11:59 pm EST.
    There is no reason for such a tight limit on range since it leads to gratuitous chops and gerrymandering.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 03, 2014, 07:37:12 AM
    There is no reason for such a tight limit on range since it leads to gratuitous chops and gerrymandering.

    The commission can amend an item. However, a 10% range is presumably too large, since it is the allowed state standard and the federal standard is stricter. Federal ranges of up to 1% have been upheld, and like with the VRA the commission has to determine if it wishes to push federal law by extending beyond what is clearly permissible.

    Speaking of the commission, ElectionsGuy has PM'ed me to say that he declines to take a seat on the commission. That moves X into the role of commissioner. JerryArkansas now joins SLCValleyMan as an alternate.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 03, 2014, 10:02:28 AM
    I vote aye on item six.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on December 04, 2014, 10:59:35 PM


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Fuzzybigfoot on December 04, 2014, 11:26:34 PM


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: publicunofficial on December 04, 2014, 11:55:07 PM


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 04, 2014, 11:57:00 PM
    I see there are no votes on Item 7, nor any questions or suggested changes. To remind the commission, under Item 3 the INEQUALITY score is used to break a tie when two plans have both the same CHOP and EROSITY scores. The higher INEQUALITY is eliminated. If one uses the range directly then a one person difference would eliminate a plan. By grouping into bands based on some statistical measure then there remains the possibility that two plans with identical CHOP and EROSITY could still both go before commission for their vote if their ranges are statistically close. The INEQUALITY table in Item 7 is one way to provide that statistical grouping. If the commission prefers they can use the range directly and not group ranges into a score.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 05, 2014, 01:05:42 AM
    I vote aye on Item 7.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 05, 2014, 06:29:09 AM
    I don't totally understand item 7, could you explain it a little more please, Muon?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 05, 2014, 07:22:32 AM
    I don't totally understand item 7, could you explain it a little more please, Muon?
    The way I interpreted it was a score on how inequitable the deviation of the districts are. So the higher the deviation, the higher the inequality score.

    I'm guessing the numbers are based on a square root or something? My mathematic theory knowledge hasn't had much fine-tuning.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: traininthedistance on December 05, 2014, 11:48:09 AM
    One can think of each county chop as having one less whole county CD in a state, which is equivalent to having one less chop of the state as a whole. So, the table is another way of saying when two plans have statistically equivalent ranges that would be expected for that number of whole county CDs or whole county groups of CDs. For example train-B (submission 2) has 3 whole county CDs (5, 6, 9) and two whole county groups of CDs (NoVa, Richmond/Hampton Roads) for a total of 4 state chops. train didn't list the deviations for his CDs, but I calculate the range to be 2211 which is a score of 6, so it is statistically above the theoretical best.

    FWIW, my range is actually 1780; from +988 (District 11) to -792 (District 5).  Knowing that these are the ranges you're choosing, I suppose just splitting Fairfax differently might get me down to a score of 5, and I'll try that at some point. I believe districts 6 and 9 together are just over 900 (they're around plus-minus 470), so pushing inequality further than that won't really work.  (Though I would argue strenuously against any efforts to allow inequality more than 1 percent; and would never myself even make a map that availed itself of half that wiggle room.)


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 05, 2014, 02:43:38 PM
    One can think of each county chop as having one less whole county CD in a state, which is equivalent to having one less chop of the state as a whole. So, the table is another way of saying when two plans have statistically equivalent ranges that would be expected for that number of whole county CDs or whole county groups of CDs. For example train-B (submission 2) has 3 whole county CDs (5, 6, 9) and two whole county groups of CDs (NoVa, Richmond/Hampton Roads) for a total of 4 state chops. train didn't list the deviations for his CDs, but I calculate the range to be 2211 which is a score of 6, so it is statistically above the theoretical best.

    FWIW, my range is actually 1780; from +988 (District 11) to -792 (District 5).  Knowing that these are the ranges you're choosing, I suppose just splitting Fairfax differently might get me down to a score of 5, and I'll try that at some point. I believe districts 6 and 9 together are just over 900 (they're around plus-minus 470), so pushing inequality further than that won't really work.  (Though I would argue strenuously against any efforts to allow inequality more than 1 percent; and would never myself even make a map that availed itself of half that wiggle room.)

    I found my error in a thin precinct in Bedford adjacent to Lynchburg. That's why deviation is included in Item 1 for plan submissions. In any case the Item 7 table would still put the score at I=6. After the correction I did some boundary manipulation. Small shifts in Portsmouth and Norfolk gets the deviations to -405/-214/+204 for those three CDs without changing the BVAP in CD 4. Small shifts in Loudoun and Fairfax got deviations of +131/+586/+534/+298 for CDs 7,8,10,11. That would bring the range down to 1378 for a score of I=5. Those types of shifts I would expect the crowd to submit to improve plans during the submission phase.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 06, 2014, 11:34:30 PM
    There is no reason for such a tight limit on range since it leads to gratuitous chops and gerrymandering.

    The commission can amend an item. However, a 10% range is presumably too large, since it is the allowed state standard and the federal standard is stricter. Federal ranges of up to 1% have been upheld, and like with the VRA the commission has to determine if it wishes to push federal law by extending beyond what is clearly permissible.

    Speaking of the commission, ElectionsGuy has PM'ed me to say that he declines to take a seat on the commission. That moves X into the role of commissioner. JerryArkansas now joins SLCValleyMan as an alternate.
    'Tennant' makes it clear that 'Karcher' was misread, and that "practicable" must take into account whether the deviations of a plan are necessary as a consequence of other state objectives.  There is nothing in 'Karcher' nor 'Kirkpatrick' that says 1% is an outside limit.

    It happens that New Jersey, using townships could reach such a limit, and so could West Virginia.

    Ideally, a Virginia commission would have established its other criteria first rather than after the population equality criteria.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 06, 2014, 11:53:55 PM
    There is no reason for such a tight limit on range since it leads to gratuitous chops and gerrymandering.

    The commission can amend an item. However, a 10% range is presumably too large, since it is the allowed state standard and the federal standard is stricter. Federal ranges of up to 1% have been upheld, and like with the VRA the commission has to determine if it wishes to push federal law by extending beyond what is clearly permissible.

    Speaking of the commission, ElectionsGuy has PM'ed me to say that he declines to take a seat on the commission. That moves X into the role of commissioner. JerryArkansas now joins SLCValleyMan as an alternate.
    'Tennant' makes it clear that 'Karcher' was misread, and that "practicable" must take into account whether the deviations of a plan are necessary as a consequence of other state objectives.  There is nothing in 'Karcher' nor 'Kirkpatrick' that says 1% is an outside limit.

    It happens that New Jersey, using townships could reach such a limit, and so could West Virginia.

    Ideally, a Virginia commission would have established its other criteria first rather than after the population equality criteria.

    I understand that, but a commission will still have a number in mind as to the outside limit of range. Even in local jurisdictions that I've worked with the body sets a range if they want to be tighter than 10% before they weigh in on other criteria. The process invariably begins by showing how large the variances have become between districts, and if the range is acceptable a local body almost always chooses to make no changes. If the post-census range is not acceptable, the body determines what is acceptable.

    Practicable is still going to be tighter than substantially equal, so the federal standard is going to be stricter than the state standard. How far can SCOTUS go before it looks like the federal standard isn't really different than the state standard?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 07, 2014, 01:05:33 AM
    Ideally, a Virginia commission would have established its other criteria first rather than after the population equality criteria.
    I understand that, but a commission will still have a number in mind as to the outside limit of range. Even in local jurisdictions that I've worked with the body sets a range if they want to be tighter than 10% before they weigh in on other criteria. Practicable is still going to be tighter than substantially equal, so the federal standard is going to be stricter than the state standard. How far can SCOTUS go before it looks like the federal standard isn't really different than the state standard?
    Wesberry v Sanders was decided on the wrong basis.   Read Justice White's concurring opinion.  And it was a mistake to set a safe harbor of 5% for state and local redistricting.  Both lead to gerrymandering.

    Consider the current Virginia litigation.  Virginia reduced the number of chops, but then claimed that some were necessary to get equal population, and therefore it was OK to have bunches for VA-3.  Had they set a higher standard for political integrity, then they couldn't have done all the chops for VA-3.

    If we are going to use the fundamental principle behind 'Wesberry v Sanders', then we should be balancing CVAP.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 07, 2014, 01:33:34 AM
    As an interest group representative from the Shenandoah Valley, I would like to express my opinion of the various preceding maps.

    Jimrtex: Your plan slices and dices the natural community of interest in NW Virginia. It is unacceptable.
    Do you like this better?

    ()


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 07, 2014, 08:30:46 AM
    Ideally, a Virginia commission would have established its other criteria first rather than after the population equality criteria.
    I understand that, but a commission will still have a number in mind as to the outside limit of range. Even in local jurisdictions that I've worked with the body sets a range if they want to be tighter than 10% before they weigh in on other criteria. Practicable is still going to be tighter than substantially equal, so the federal standard is going to be stricter than the state standard. How far can SCOTUS go before it looks like the federal standard isn't really different than the state standard?
    Wesberry v Sanders was decided on the wrong basis.   Read Justice White's concurring opinion.  And it was a mistake to set a safe harbor of 5% for state and local redistricting.  Both lead to gerrymandering.

    Consider the current Virginia litigation.  Virginia reduced the number of chops, but then claimed that some were necessary to get equal population, and therefore it was OK to have bunches for VA-3.  Had they set a higher standard for political integrity, then they couldn't have done all the chops for VA-3.

    If we are going to use the fundamental principle behind 'Wesberry v Sanders', then we should be balancing CVAP.

    I agree with you about how VA could have fared better in court, but that doesn't address population variance. The theoretical question of constitutional law doesn't necessarily solve the problem that would face a real commission today. In general a commission acts after a Census has released new population data. If the districts are malapportioned due to the new populations, then they must be redrawn. That forces the question as to how much variance in a CD would be construed as malapportioned after a Census, since that then sets the inequality goal for the commission. Despite the lack of clarity on that point in Karcher and other cases, experts will advise redistricting panels as to what range inequality may be a safe harbor when other neutral criteria are used in the plan. Given that SCOTUS has upheld plans of nearly 1% range, that number seems like sound advice to a commission, unless that commission specifically wants to set up a test case to demonstrate that larger ranges will survive SCOTUS scrutiny.

    Adding: In Tennant WV had a range of 9.6% of the quota for its CDs after the Census and before redistricting. That would qualify as substantially equal under a state standard, but the  parties recognized that it would not be a minor variation and could not be justified for a federal plan. That prompted the legislature to redraw the districts. The adopted plan, upheld by SCOTUS, reduced 9.6% to 0.8% and that then constituted a minor variation that could be justified by the criteria used by the state. If a plan has more than a 1% range I would expect significant legal debate as to whether that can be considered a minor variation.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 07, 2014, 03:45:41 PM
    [Wesberry v Sanders was decided on the wrong basis.   Read Justice White's concurring opinion.  And it was a mistake to set a safe harbor of 5% for state and local redistricting.  Both lead to gerrymandering.

    Consider the current Virginia litigation.  Virginia reduced the number of chops, but then claimed that some were necessary to get equal population, and therefore it was OK to have bunches for VA-3.  Had they set a higher standard for political integrity, then they couldn't have done all the chops for VA-3.

    If we are going to use the fundamental principle behind 'Wesberry v Sanders', then we should be balancing CVAP.

    I agree with you about how VA could have fared better in court, but that doesn't address population variance. The theoretical question of constitutional law doesn't necessarily solve the problem that would face a real commission today. In general a commission acts after a Census has released new population data. If the districts are malapportioned due to the new populations, then they must be redrawn. That forces the question as to how much variance in a CD would be construed as malapportioned after a Census, since that then sets the inequality goal for the commission. Despite the lack of clarity on that point in Karcher and other cases, experts will advise redistricting panels as to what range inequality may be a safe harbor when other neutral criteria are used in the plan. Given that SCOTUS has upheld plans of nearly 1% range, that number seems like sound advice to a commission, unless that commission specifically wants to set up a test case to demonstrate that larger ranges will survive SCOTUS scrutiny.
    That a commission acts after the census has been released is a flaw in process.

    If Virginia had set a more relaxed population standard in order to better conform to political subdivisions and UCCs, then they would never been able to produce VA-3, or if they had, it would have been so off the charts in terms of chops, that it could not be created.  Virginia is hiding their use of exact population equality, and purported intent to reduce chops.

    Experts will advise legislators that they can get away with murder if they adhere to strict population equality.

    The principle behind an independent commission is that they don't want to commit murder.  Any advisers would take that into account.

    Alternatively, the commission could do like was done in Arkansas after the 2000 census, when the legislature passed two plans, one a whole-county plan, and another with three county splits that would make the districts identical in population.

    Nobody challenged the whole county plan.

    Anybody who sues over population equality is not trying to get population equality.  They are trying to use any population inequality as a basis for a larger attack, which will cause a court to redraw the map.

    Making small gratuitous chops of a few 1000 people won't be worth the effort of suing.

    I have produced a plan with 3 chops, all within UCC within 1% deviation.  If an alternative within 0.5% deviation balloons the number of chops and ignores UCC, then the greater equality serves no legitimate or rational purpose.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 07, 2014, 06:12:43 PM
    That a commission acts after the census has been released is a flaw in process.
    If the Census shows the population changes to the district have induced minimal variations to equal population, there is no reason for the commission to act at all. Therefore the commission must wait for the Census results.

    Quote
    If Virginia had set a more relaxed population standard in order to better conform to political subdivisions and UCCs, then they would never been able to produce VA-3, or if they had, it would have been so off the charts in terms of chops, that it could not be created.  Virginia is hiding their use of exact population equality, and purported intent to reduce chops.
    I have no disagreement, other than to add that VA still had the constraint of creating a CD where the black population would be likely to elect the candidate of their choice.

    Quote
    Experts will advise legislators that they can get away with murder if they adhere to strict population equality.

    The principle behind an independent commission is that they don't want to commit murder.  Any advisers would take that into account.
    True, but in local redistricting the question is still put the body as to what maximum range they will tolerate, and many adopt a standard tighter than 10%. In light of Tennant, I would expect advisers to congressional commissions to do the same, but pose the question in terms of what range will they consider to be consistent with a minor variance: 0.79%, 1%, 2%, etc.

    Quote
    Alternatively, the commission could do like was done in Arkansas after the 2000 census, when the legislature passed two plans, one a whole-county plan, and another with three county splits that would make the districts identical in population.

    Nobody challenged the whole county plan.

    Anybody who sues over population equality is not trying to get population equality.  They are trying to use any population inequality as a basis for a larger attack, which will cause a court to redraw the map.
    The range of the AR plan was very nearly 1% (1.002% from the Statistical Abstract for 2003). Even if it was challenged and upheld it wouldn't give us much guidance beyond the 0.8% allowed in Tennant.

    Quote
    Making small gratuitous chops of a few 1000 people won't be worth the effort of suing.

    I have produced a plan with 3 chops, all within UCC within 1% deviation.  If an alternative within 0.5% deviation balloons the number of chops and ignores UCC, then the greater equality serves no legitimate or rational purpose.

    And if a 2% range is ok, then someone else will propose a plan with fewer chops or less erosity and a 5% range and claim its ok by the same logic. But at some point variances cease to be minor. I don't know where that point is but it is presumably somewhere between 0.8% and 9.6% based on the facts in Tennant. As an adviser I would leave that decision to the commission.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 08, 2014, 06:25:36 AM
    The discussion/voting period for 6, 7 and 8 have passed. Item 6 has four votes in favor from Morgieb, X, Miles and fuzzy, so it is adopted. Item 7 only has one vote in favor from Morgieb, so votes are needed from other commissioners (or alternates) before it is adopted, rejected, or amended. Item 8 has no votes or discussion from the commission, so perhaps an extension of the discussion/voting period is in order.

    Would it help if I move the approved items into a separate thread, so one doesn't have to scroll back through multiple pages?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: JerryArkansas on December 08, 2014, 06:45:15 AM
    I approve of items 7 and 8.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 08, 2014, 07:55:05 AM
    The discussion/voting period for 6, 7 and 8 have passed. Item 6 has four votes in favor from Morgieb, X, Miles and fuzzy, so it is adopted. Item 7 only has one vote in favor from Morgieb, so votes are needed from other commissioners (or alternates) before it is adopted, rejected, or amended. Item 8 has no votes or discussion from the commission, so perhaps an extension of the discussion/voting period is in order.

    Would it help if I move the approved items into a separate thread, so one doesn't have to scroll back through multiple pages?

    Yeah, that'd be very helpful!  Aye on 7, btw.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 08, 2014, 10:52:58 AM
    The discussion/voting period for 6, 7 and 8 have passed. Item 6 has four votes in favor from Morgieb, X, Miles and fuzzy, so it is adopted. Item 7 only has one vote in favor from Morgieb, so votes are needed from other commissioners (or alternates) before it is adopted, rejected, or amended. Item 8 has no votes or discussion from the commission, so perhaps an extension of the discussion/voting period is in order.

    Would it help if I move the approved items into a separate thread, so one doesn't have to scroll back through multiple pages?

    Yeah, that'd be very helpful!  Aye on 7, btw.

    I've done that, and those items now approved are in a thread titled The Muon Rules (https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=203858.0).


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 08, 2014, 12:46:44 PM
    That a commission acts after the census has been released is a flaw in process.
    If the Census shows the population changes to the district have induced minimal variations to equal population, there is no reason for the commission to act at all. Therefore the commission must wait for the Census results.
    There is an 8.4% difference between VA-9 and VA-10 according to the 2013 ACS.  It would gross negligence to wait until 2021.

    Quote
    Quote
    If Virginia had set a more relaxed population standard in order to better conform to political subdivisions and UCCs, then they would never been able to produce VA-3, or if they had, it would have been so off the charts in terms of chops, that it could not be created.  Virginia is hiding their use of exact population equality, and purported intent to reduce chops.
    I have no disagreement, other than to add that VA still had the constraint of creating a CD where the black population would be likely to elect the candidate of their choice.
    There is no area in Virginia that satisfies the first prong of the Gingles test.

    Quote
    Quote
    Experts will advise legislators that they can get away with murder if they adhere to strict population equality.

    The principle behind an independent commission is that they don't want to commit murder.  Any advisers would take that into account.
    True, but in local redistricting the question is still put the body as to what maximum range they will tolerate, and many adopt a standard tighter than 10%. In light of Tennant, I would expect advisers to congressional commissions to do the same, but pose the question in terms of what range will they consider to be consistent with a minor variance: 0.79%, 1%, 2%, etc.
    Did West Virginia do this?

    Quote
    Quote
    Alternatively, the commission could do like was done in Arkansas after the 2000 census, when the legislature passed two plans, one a whole-county plan, and another with three county splits that would make the districts identical in population.

    Nobody challenged the whole county plan.

    Anybody who sues over population equality is not trying to get population equality.  They are trying to use any population inequality as a basis for a larger attack, which will cause a court to redraw the map.
    The range of the AR plan was very nearly 1% (1.002% from the Statistical Abstract for 2003). Even if it was challenged and upheld it wouldn't give us much guidance beyond the 0.8% allowed in Tennant.
    Kanawha County has 191,000 persons.  The next most populous county, Berkeley, barely half of that.  Pulaski County has 391,000.

    Quote
    Quote
    Making small gratuitous chops of a few 1000 people won't be worth the effort of suing.

    I have produced a plan with 3 chops, all within UCC within 1% deviation.  If an alternative within 0.5% deviation balloons the number of chops and ignores UCC, then the greater equality serves no legitimate or rational purpose.

    And if a 2% range is ok, then someone else will propose a plan with fewer chops or less erosity and a 5% range and claim its ok by the same logic. But at some point variances cease to be minor. I don't know where that point is but it is presumably somewhere between 0.8% and 9.6% based on the facts in Tennant. As an adviser I would leave that decision to the commission.
    Even more reason to put emphasis on the standard deviation or mean absolute deviation.

    It may be worthwhile for the commission to consider the zero chop plans, rather than a priori setting a hard deviation limit.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 08, 2014, 02:03:28 PM
    There is no area in Virginia that satisfies the first prong of the Gingles test.

    I can construct a >50% BVAP CD that includes none of Richmond or Petersburg and is all whole counties/cities (Brunswick to Surry to Suffolk) plus the black areas of the independent cities of the Hampton Roads. It is compact by almost any standard geographic measure, since the erosity is confined to those relatively small areas in the Hampton Roads. The fact that it links rural and urban areas would not cause it to fail Gingles 1.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 08, 2014, 04:54:58 PM
    There is no area in Virginia that satisfies the first prong of the Gingles test.

    I can construct a >50% BVAP CD that includes none of Richmond or Petersburg and is all whole counties/cities (Brunswick to Surry to Suffolk) plus the black areas of the independent cities of the Hampton Roads. It is compact by almost any standard geographic measure, since the erosity is confined to those relatively small areas in the Hampton Roads. The fact that it links rural and urban areas would not cause it to fail Gingles 1.

    Brunswick is at least as far from Hampton Roads as Richmond.   I assume you crack Newport News, Hampton, Portsmouth, Norfolk, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake.   Do you exclude Isle of Wight?

    You have violated traditional redistricting concepts such as integrity of political subdivisions, and unnecessary agglomeration of rural and urbam areas makes it conceptually non-compact.  Your proposed district is no better than the district turned down in Lulac v Perry


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 08, 2014, 08:43:32 PM
    There is no area in Virginia that satisfies the first prong of the Gingles test.

    I can construct a >50% BVAP CD that includes none of Richmond or Petersburg and is all whole counties/cities (Brunswick to Surry to Suffolk) plus the black areas of the independent cities of the Hampton Roads. It is compact by almost any standard geographic measure, since the erosity is confined to those relatively small areas in the Hampton Roads. The fact that it links rural and urban areas would not cause it to fail Gingles 1.

    Brunswick is at least as far from Hampton Roads as Richmond.   I assume you crack Newport News, Hampton, Portsmouth, Norfolk, Virginia Beach and Chesapeake.   Do you exclude Isle of Wight?

    You have violated traditional redistricting concepts such as integrity of political subdivisions, and unnecessary agglomeration of rural and urbam areas makes it conceptually non-compact.  Your proposed district is no better than the district turned down in Lulac v Perry

    I do not exclude Isle of Wight, and as much as we might like it to be otherwise, the VRA does not care if political subdivisions are chopped in order to comply. There is nothing in Gingles to suggest that conceptual compactness has any bearing on prong 1.

    LULAC is not applicable here. The question here is not whether the district meets section 2, but whether one is required by section 2. In LULAC there was already a determination that TX needed such a district and SCOTUS found that District 23 had been redrawn in such a way as to deny Latino voters as a group the opportunity to elect a candidate of their choice. District 25 was found to be a non-compact replacement, but District 23 as finally drawn after LULAC is a clear linkage of urban and rural areas with much greater separation than the VA district I suggest would meet section 2.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 09, 2014, 11:38:06 AM
    While I wait for votes on Item 8. Here's another map showing neighborhood areas for a couple of larger independent cities that might be chopped in some plans. The areas are approximated by the voting districts in DRA. Hampton districts are based on neighborhood districts recognized by the City of Hampton (http://www.hampton.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1617). Newport News districts are based on real estate market areas (http://danpetershomes.blogspot.com/2012/11/peninsula-market-update-newport-news.html) from the MLS.

    ()

    Hampton Areas

    District 1; pop 22,377; BVAP 41.8%
    District 2; pop 10,487; BVAP 46.6%
    District 3; pop 12,770; BVAP 44.8%
    District 4; pop 13,580; BVAP 29.2%
    District 5; pop 11,864; BVAP 17.0%
    District 6; pop 12,846; BVAP 37.3%
    District 7; pop 12,833; BVAP 59.3%
    District 8; pop 17,116; BVAP 58.8%
    District 9; pop 11,748; BVAP 69.6%
    District 10; pop 11,815; BVAP 71.2%


    Newport News Areas

    Denbigh North (11); pop 52,397; BVAP 37.2%
    Denbigh South (12); pop 32,093; BVAP 30.2%
    Midtown West (13); pop 26,531; BVAP 14.1%
    Midtown East (14); pop 36,973; BVAP 30.1%
    South (15); pop 32,725; BVAP 75.2%


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 13, 2014, 04:04:40 PM
    Proposed combinations of counties and independent cities.

    While independent cities in Virginia are treated as county equivalents by the Census Bureau, they really don't represent separate communities of interest, and in some cases are not totally legally separate, with some sharing county offices with their surrounding counties.  The Bureau of Economic Affairs only treats independent cities as a separate entity if they have a population over 100,000, or have absorbed all of their former county.  To some extent in Virginia, "independent city" and "city" are almost synonymous.  The largest towns that are not independent cities are Leesburg and Blacksburg, both with less than 50,000 persons.

    Treating independent cities as counties for redistricting purposes causes problems for erosity and chop measurements because of their typical small size.

    Hampton, Newport News, and Virginia Beach qualify under both the population criteria and having absorbed their orignal county.  Chesapeake does in a certain sense, since it has 222,000 persons, and since it was created by the merger of the independent city of South Norfolk and remainder of Norfolk County, not in Norfolk or Portsmouth.   Suffolk city qualifies based on its annexation of Nansemond city, which itself was created from the remnant of Nansemond County not in Suffolk city.

    The only large independent cities that have not absorbed all of their original counties are Richmond, Roanoke, and Alexandria.  This leaves Henrico, Roanoke, and Arlington counties as the only remainders of counties from which the larger cities have separated.  Roanoke County also includes the smaller independent city of Salem.   The District of Columbia originally had two counties, Washington (the portion ceded by Maryland) and Alexandria (the portion ceded by Virginia) and three municipalities, Alexandria, Georgetown, and Washington.  When the area south of the Potomac was retroceded to Virginia, it became Alexandria County, Virginia.  The portion not within Alexandria city was renamed to Arlington County in 1920.

    The Bureau of Economic Affairs combines Colonial Heights with Dinwiddie County and Petersburg city.  This is problematic since Colonial Heights is barely contiguous with Petersburg, and was created from Chesterfield County.  Placing it with Dinwiddie County would give greater importance to economics than political history, and would call in to question the whole concept of using political subdivisions as representing communities of interest.  So in the following tables, I have placed Colonial Heights with Chesterfield County.

    Most independent cities were created from a single county, though some have annexed areas in adjacent counties.   Galax city is the exception, having been created from almost equal population from Carroll and Grayson counties.  The Census Bureau and BEA both place Galax with Carroll County.

    Independent Cities that are combined with original counties, or are treated as counties for chop and erosity analysis.

    Albemarle + Charlottesville
    Alexandria  (IC)
    Alleghany + Covington
    Augusta, Staunton + Waynesboro
    Bedford + Bedford city (as of 2013, Bedford is no longer an independent city).
    Campbell + Lynchburg
    Carroll + Galax
    Chesapeake (IC)
    Chesterfield + Colonial Heights
    Dinwiddie + Petersburg
    Fairfax, Fairfax City + Falls Church
    Frederick + Winchester
    Greensville + Emporia
    Hampton (IC)
    Henry + Martinsville
    James City county + Williamsburg
    Montgomery + Radford
    Newport News (IC)
    Norfolk (IC)
    Pittsylvania + Danville
    Portsmouth (IC)
    Prince George + Hopewell
    Prince William, Manassas + Manassas Park
    Richmond (IC)
    Roanoke (IC) (Roanoke city is separate from Roanoke County because of its population)
    Roanoke + Salem (but Roanoke County includes Salem (IC)).
    Rockbridge, Buena Vista + Lexington
    Rockingham + Harrisonburg
    Southampton + Franklin
    Spotsylvania + Fredericksburg
    Suffolk (IC)
    Virginia Beach (IC)
    Washington + Bristol
    Wise + Norton
    York + Poquoson

    Counties with no associated independent cities for measurement of chop and erosity.

    Accomack
    Amelia
    Amherst
    Appomattox
    Arlington
    Bath
    Bland
    Botetourt
    Brunswick
    Buchanan
    Buckingham
    Caroline
    Charles City county
    Charlotte
    Clarke
    Craig
    Culpeper
    Cumberland
    Dickenson
    Essex
    Fauquier
    Floyd
    Fluvanna
    Franklin
    Giles
    Gloucester
    Goochland
    Grayson
    Greene
    Halifax
    Hanover
    Henrico
    Highland
    Isle of Wight
    King George
    King William
    King and Queen
    Lancaster
    Lee
    Loudoun
    Louisa
    Lunenburg
    Madison
    Mathews
    Mecklenburg
    Middlesex
    Nelson
    New Kent
    Northampton
    Northumberland
    Nottoway
    Orange
    Patrick
    Powhatan
    Prince Edward
    Pulaski
    Rappahannock
    Richmond county
    Russell
    Scott
    Shenandoah
    Smyth
    Stafford
    Surry
    Sussex
    Tazewell
    Warren
    Westmoreland
    Wythe


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 13, 2014, 05:06:01 PM
    Proposed combinations of counties and independent cities.

    While independent cities in Virginia are treated as county equivalents by the Census Bureau, they really don't represent separate communities of interest, and in some cases are not totally legally separate, with some sharing county offices with their surrounding counties.  The Bureau of Economic Affairs only treats independent cities as a separate entity if they have a population over 100,000, or have absorbed all of their former county.  To some extent in Virginia, "independent city" and "city" are almost synonymous.  The largest towns that are not independent cities are Leesburg and Blacksburg, both with less than 50,000 persons.

    Treating independent cities as counties for redistricting purposes causes problems for erosity and chop measurements because of their typical small size.

    Hampton, Newport News, and Virginia Beach qualify under both the population criteria and having absorbed their orignal county.  Chesapeake does in a certain sense, since it has 222,000 persons, and since it was created by the merger of the independent city of South Norfolk and remainder of Norfolk County, not in Norfolk or Portsmouth.   Suffolk city qualifies based on its annexation of Nansemond city, which itself was created from the remnant of Nansemond County not in Suffolk city.

    The only large independent cities that have not absorbed all of their original counties are Richmond, Roanoke, and Alexandria.  This leaves Henrico, Roanoke, and Arlington counties as the only remainders of counties from which the larger cities have separated.  Roanoke County also includes the smaller independent city of Salem.   The District of Columbia originally had two counties, Washington (the portion ceded by Maryland) and Alexandria (the portion ceded by Virginia) and three municipalities, Alexandria, Georgetown, and Washington.  When the area south of the Potomac was retroceded to Virginia, it became Alexandria County, Virginia.  The portion not within Alexandria city was renamed to Arlington County in 1920.

    The Bureau of Economic Affairs combines Colonial Heights with Dinwiddie County and Petersburg city.  This is problematic since Colonial Heights is barely contiguous with Petersburg, and was created from Chesterfield County.  Placing it with Dinwiddie County would give greater importance to economics than political history, and would call in to question the whole concept of using political subdivisions as representing communities of interest.  So in the following tables, I have placed Colonial Heights with Chesterfield County.

    Most independent cities were created from a single county, though some have annexed areas in adjacent counties.   Galax city is the exception, having been created from almost equal population from Carroll and Grayson counties.  The Census Bureau and BEA both place Galax with Carroll County.

    Independent Cities that are combined with original counties, or are treated as counties for chop and erosity analysis.

    Albemarle + Charlottesville
    Alexandria  (IC)
    Alleghany + Covington
    Augusta, Staunton + Waynesboro
    Bedford + Bedford city (as of 2013, Bedford is no longer an independent city).
    Campbell + Lynchburg
    Carroll + Galax
    Chesapeake (IC)
    Chesterfield + Colonial Heights
    Dinwiddie + Petersburg
    Fairfax, Fairfax City + Falls Church
    Frederick + Winchester
    Greensville + Emporia
    Hampton (IC)
    Henry + Martinsville
    James City county + Williamsburg
    Montgomery + Radford
    Newport News (IC)
    Norfolk (IC)
    Pittsylvania + Danville
    Portsmouth (IC)
    Prince George + Hopewell
    Prince William, Manassas + Manassas Park
    Richmond (IC)
    Roanoke (IC) (Roanoke city is separate from Roanoke County because of its population)
    Roanoke + Salem (but Roanoke County includes Salem (IC)).
    Rockbridge, Buena Vista + Lexington
    Rockingham + Harrisonburg
    Southampton + Franklin
    Spotsylvania + Fredericksburg
    Suffolk (IC)
    Virginia Beach (IC)
    Washington + Bristol
    Wise + Norton
    York + Poquoson

    Counties with no associated independent cities for measurement of chop and erosity.

    Accomack
    Amelia
    Amherst
    Appomattox
    Arlington
    Bath
    Bland
    Botetourt
    Brunswick
    Buchanan
    Buckingham
    Caroline
    Charles City county
    Charlotte
    Clarke
    Craig
    Culpeper
    Cumberland
    Dickenson
    Essex
    Fauquier
    Floyd
    Fluvanna
    Franklin
    Giles
    Gloucester
    Goochland
    Grayson
    Greene
    Halifax
    Hanover
    Henrico
    Highland
    Isle of Wight
    King George
    King William
    King and Queen
    Lancaster
    Lee
    Loudoun
    Louisa
    Lunenburg
    Madison
    Mathews
    Mecklenburg
    Middlesex
    Nelson
    New Kent
    Northampton
    Northumberland
    Nottoway
    Orange
    Patrick
    Powhatan
    Prince Edward
    Pulaski
    Rappahannock
    Richmond county
    Russell
    Scott
    Shenandoah
    Smyth
    Stafford
    Surry
    Sussex
    Tazewell
    Warren
    Westmoreland
    Wythe


    Since there hasn't been much discussion on this point, and only one alternate vote, this seems like a potential amendment to Item 8 before the commission. The originally proposed Item 8 is

    Item 8. The primary units of redistricting in VA are the counties and independent cities. Independent cities are treated as equal to counties for redistricting, and are understood to be included when scoring describes counties. Secondary units in redistricting may include larger communities of interest made up of groups of whole counties and smaller communities of interest that wholly divide a county as adopted by the commission.

    An amended version to consider is
    Item 8A. The primary units of redistricting in VA are the counties. Independent cities are treated as equal to counties for redistricting when the independent cities have populations in excess of 100,000 or have absorbed all of their former county. These qualified independent cities are understood to be included when scoring describes counties. Other independent cities are considered to be part of the county that they are assigned to by the Bureau of Economic Affairs. Secondary units in redistricting may include larger communities of interest made up of groups of whole counties and smaller communities of interest that wholly divide a county as adopted by the commission.

    I avoided creating a special exception for Colonial Heights. There are a number of states that have discontiguous counties and municipalities, and I'm not troubled by creating one here in the interest of uniform rules. Of course the commission is free to vote on either Item 8, 8A, or 8A with the Colonial Heights exception.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 14, 2014, 12:01:27 AM
    Proposed combinations of counties and independent cities.

    While independent cities in Virginia are treated as county equivalents by the Census Bureau, they really don't represent separate communities of interest, and in some cases are not totally legally separate, with some sharing county offices with their surrounding counties.  The Bureau of Economic Affairs only treats independent cities as a separate entity if they have a population over 100,000, or have absorbed all of their former county.  To some extent in Virginia, "independent city" and "city" are almost synonymous.  The largest towns that are not independent cities are Leesburg and Blacksburg, both with less than 50,000 persons.

    Treating independent cities as counties for redistricting purposes causes problems for erosity and chop measurements because of their typical small size.

    Hampton, Newport News, and Virginia Beach qualify under both the population criteria and having absorbed their orignal county.  Chesapeake does in a certain sense, since it has 222,000 persons, and since it was created by the merger of the independent city of South Norfolk and remainder of Norfolk County, not in Norfolk or Portsmouth.   Suffolk city qualifies based on its annexation of Nansemond city, which itself was created from the remnant of Nansemond County not in Suffolk city.

    The only large independent cities that have not absorbed all of their original counties are Richmond, Roanoke, and Alexandria.  This leaves Henrico, Roanoke, and Arlington counties as the only remainders of counties from which the larger cities have separated.  Roanoke County also includes the smaller independent city of Salem.   The District of Columbia originally had two counties, Washington (the portion ceded by Maryland) and Alexandria (the portion ceded by Virginia) and three municipalities, Alexandria, Georgetown, and Washington.  When the area south of the Potomac was retroceded to Virginia, it became Alexandria County, Virginia.  The portion not within Alexandria city was renamed to Arlington County in 1920.

    The Bureau of Economic Affairs combines Colonial Heights with Dinwiddie County and Petersburg city.  This is problematic since Colonial Heights is barely contiguous with Petersburg, and was created from Chesterfield County.  Placing it with Dinwiddie County would give greater importance to economics than political history, and would call in to question the whole concept of using political subdivisions as representing communities of interest.  So in the following tables, I have placed Colonial Heights with Chesterfield County.

    Most independent cities were created from a single county, though some have annexed areas in adjacent counties.   Galax city is the exception, having been created from almost equal population from Carroll and Grayson counties.  The Census Bureau and BEA both place Galax with Carroll County.



    Since there hasn't been much discussion on this point, and only one alternate vote, this seems like a potential amendment to Item 8 before the commission. The originally proposed Item 8 is

    Item 8. The primary units of redistricting in VA are the counties and independent cities. Independent cities are treated as equal to counties for redistricting, and are understood to be included when scoring describes counties. Secondary units in redistricting may include larger communities of interest made up of groups of whole counties and smaller communities of interest that wholly divide a county as adopted by the commission.

    An amended version to consider is
    Item 8A. The primary units of redistricting in VA are the counties. Independent cities are treated as equal to counties for redistricting when the independent cities have populations in excess of 100,000 or have absorbed all of their former county. These qualified independent cities are understood to be included when scoring describes counties. Other independent cities are considered to be part of the county that they are assigned to by the Bureau of Economic Affairs. Secondary units in redistricting may include larger communities of interest made up of groups of whole counties and smaller communities of interest that wholly divide a county as adopted by the commission.

    I avoided creating a special exception for Colonial Heights. There are a number of states that have discontiguous counties and municipalities, and I'm not troubled by creating one here in the interest of uniform rules. Of course the commission is free to vote on either Item 8, 8A, or 8A with the Colonial Heights exception.
    An alternative definition is provided in the publication Population of States and Counties of the United States, 1790 to 1990 (https://www.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/PopulationofStatesandCountiesoftheUnitedStates1790-1990.pdf).  See Virginia section beginning on publication page 166, PDF page 177.

    The BEA standard does provide an objective standard for separating larger cities.   But a state commission would be competent to make its own standard.   I regard the BEA standard for Colonial Heights to be exceptional, rather than other way around.

    If creating its own standard based on population of cities, the commission might consider the following:  The largest towns in Virginia are Leesburg and Blacksburg, with populations in the mid-40,000s.   Virginia does not have "independent cities" per se, but rather cities are indepedent of their county, while municipalities which are towns are not.  The independent cities that are of comparable size, Charlottesville, Danville, and Harrisonburg are well interior to their respective counties of Albermarle, Pittsylvania, and Rockingham, such that to even reach the cities with a district boundary, the county would necessarily be split/

    The next largest independent city is Lynchburg, with a population of just over 75,000.  A threshold of 50,000 might be used, since that is the threshold for classifying an area as metropolitan statistical area.  On the other hand, metropolitan statistical areas are comprised of counties, so using an independent city is somewhat anomalous, on a national scale.  Lynchburg is also problematic because of its location at the intersection of three counties.   Rather than being treated of a community of interest, it might serve as an attractor for a district boundary.

    Cities and counties of interest in setting a standard:

    Citiies that have absorbed all of their former counties:

    Hampton (Elizabeth City county).
    Newport News (Warwick)
    Suffolk (Nansemond)
    Virginia Beach (Princess Anne)

    Three independent cities formed from the former Norfolk County.  The city of Norfolk has also annexed territory from Princess Anne County, prior to that county becoming Virginia Beach.  Norfolk and Portsmouth were from created from Norfolk County, as was the independent city of South Norfolk.  In 1963, South Norfolk merged with the remainder of Norfolk County to become the city of Chesapeake.  Note that Portsmouth no longer has a population over 100,000.  Combination of Portsmouth with Chesapeake seems somewhat odd.  And combining all three may encourage chopping of the cities, which might count as a single chop.  It might also be possible to distinguish a city chop from a county chop.

    Norfolk (IC)
    Portsmouth (IC)
    Chesapeake (IC)

    Two entities that were originally ceded to the United States to form the District of Columbia, and then retroceded to form Alexandria County.  After Alexandria city separated, the remainder was renamed Arlington County.  Alexandria has also annexed considerable territory from Fairfax County.  A division between the two is not a problem, and treating cuts of both as one would be.

    Alexandria  (IC)
    Arlington

    Richmond has annexed south of the James River, including the independent city of Manchester, and other territory from Chesterfield County, such that the logical unit for a metropolitan government might consist of Chesterfield and Henrico counties and Richmond.  Chesterfield now is the most populous of the three.  Combining as a single entity might encourage additional chops of the separate entities.

    Richmond (IC)
    Henrico
    Chesterfield + Colonial Heights

    It would be impossible to split Roanoke city without splitting Roanoke County, so combining might encourage splitting of both.

    Roanoke (IC)
    Roanoke + Salem (but Roanoke County includes Salem (IC)).

    Cutting the threshold to 50,000 would permit Lynchburg to be treated as a separate entity, which appears to be on a map at the junction of three counties.

    Campbell + Lynchburg

    Colonial Heights was formed from Chesterfield County but is nearer to Petersburg than Richmond.  Petersburg is in the corner of Dinwiddie County, and when formed also included territory from Chesterfield and Prince George counties, and has also annexed territory from Prince George county.  A case might be made for making Petersburg separate on VRA reasons (is is 77% black).  Physically, it appears to have largely cut out from Prince George county.

    Chesterfield + Colonial Heights
    Dinwiddie + Petersburg


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 14, 2014, 12:24:15 AM
    District numbering.   To make it easier to compare plans, may a suggest the following numbering scheme.

    Generally, there will be two districts in the Hampton Roads area, three in the remainder of the eastern Piedmond/Tidewater areas, three in the western mountain areas, and three in the Washington/NOVA areas.

    So specifically.

    1) The district that includes the largest share of Virginia Beach.
    2) The other district than includes the largest share of the Hampton Roads UCC (York and James City counties, plus independent cities of Poquoson, Williamsburg, Newport News, Hampton, Suffolk, Portsmouth, Norfolk, Chesapeake, and Virginia Beach).

    3) District containing areas north of the James River to the Potomac.
    4) District containing the largest share of Richmond (if 4 and 2 are the same, then another district that is generally between 3 and 5.
    5) District containing the Southside.

    6) District containing the western tip of Virginia.
    7) Next more northerly district.
    8) Next more northerly district.

    11) District containing largest share of Arlington County and Alexandria city.
    10) District containing largest share of Fairfax and Arlington counties, Alexandria, Fairfax, and Falls Church county.
    9) District including largest share of Washington UCC (above plus Loudon, Prince William, Stafford, and Spotsylvania counties, and the cities of Manassas, Manassas Park, and Fredericksburg).

    Even if all your districts don't fit the above scheme, some will.  Fit those districts to the scheme, and then assign the other numbers.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 14, 2014, 05:49:42 AM

    An alternative definition is provided in the publication Population of States and Counties of the United States, 1790 to 1990 (https://www.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/PopulationofStatesandCountiesoftheUnitedStates1790-1990.pdf).  See Virginia section beginning on publication page 166, PDF page 177.

    The BEA standard does provide an objective standard for separating larger cities.   But a state commission would be competent to make its own standard.   I regard the BEA standard for Colonial Heights to be exceptional, rather than other way around.

    If creating its own standard based on population of cities, the commission might consider the following:  The largest towns in Virginia are Leesburg and Blacksburg, with populations in the mid-40,000s.   Virginia does not have "independent cities" per se, but rather cities are indepedent of their county, while municipalities which are towns are not.  The independent cities that are of comparable size, Charlottesville, Danville, and Harrisonburg are well interior to their respective counties of Albermarle, Pittsylvania, and Rockingham, such that to even reach the cities with a district boundary, the county would necessarily be split/

    The next largest independent city is Lynchburg, with a population of just over 75,000.  A threshold of 50,000 might be used, since that is the threshold for classifying an area as metropolitan statistical area.  On the other hand, metropolitan statistical areas are comprised of counties, so using an independent city is somewhat anomalous, on a national scale.  Lynchburg is also problematic because of its location at the intersection of three counties.   Rather than being treated of a community of interest, it might serve as an attractor for a district boundary.

    The 50K threshold is another reasonable alternative to 100K and more consistent with the use of UCCs derived from MSAs. In fact one could go a step further and define an independent city as separate from the county if it has at least 25K in an urbanized area, exactly as for the UCCs. Lynchburg shouldn't be a problem as a border community since the CoI should be addressed by the UCC.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 15, 2014, 09:31:41 AM
    Since the commission seems to be on holiday, I'll add another set of city subdivisions. In the meantime, as jimrtex notes through his suggestions, Item 8 sets the direction of the scoring for chops and erosity, since it defines the primary units that should be preserved. There are at least four variants for the commission to choose from, and the next sets of rules are on hold until this item is resolved.

    Here are the subdivisions for Norfolk and adjacent cities south of Hampton Roads. The five Norfolk subdivisions follow the neighborhood service areas. The four Portsmouth subdivisions follow real estate areas. The six Chesapeake subdivisions follow the official boroughs. The seven Virginia Beach subdivisions follow the former boroughs as now used by the city public works department.

    ()

    City of Norfolk
    Neighborhood Area 1: pop 17,545; BVAP 66.4%
    Neighborhood Area 2: pop 45,742; BVAP 68.1%
    Neighborhood Area 3: pop 40,459; BVAP 54.2%
    Neighborhood Area 4: pop 64,574; BVAP 25.9%
    Neighborhood Area 5: pop 74,483; BVAP 23.1%

    City of Portsmouth
    Churchland Area (6): pop 25,739; BVAP 42.4%
    Olde Towne Area (7): pop 22,172; BVAP 67.8%
    Victory Area ( 8 ): pop 23,816; BVAP 69.3%
    Midtown Area (9): pop 23,808; BVAP 24.1%

    City of Chesapeake
    Western Branch Borough (10): pop 32,624; BVAP 30.0%
    Deep Creek Borough (11): pop 36,223; BVAP 35.6%
    Pleasant Grove Borough (12): pop 51,806; BVAP 9.5%
    South Norfolk Borough (13): pop 23,894; BVAP 53.6%
    Washington Borough (14): pop 68,346; BVAP 31.6%
    Butts Road Borough (15): pop 9,316; BVAP 23.1%

    City of Virginia Beach
    Bayside (16): pop 75,350; BVAP 22.7%
    Centerville (17): pop 82,741; BVAP 23.6%
    Kempsville (18): pop 56,569; BVAP 16.6%
    Beach (19): pop 49,317; BVAP 13.6%
    Lynnhaven (20): pop 41,511; BVAP 3.9%
    Rose Hall (21): pop 66,857; BVAP 26.1%
    Princess Anne (22): pop 65,649; BVAP 11.8%


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 18, 2014, 10:37:34 PM
    Item 8 is still unresolved, so I want to show how it would impact future rules about scoring. One type of cluster is the urban county cluster (UCC) and is defined as those counties in the same metropolitan statistical area that have an urbanized population of 25K or more or have at least 40% urbanized area. The idea is that UCCs represent a community of interest as important as a county. Chops of a UCC in excess of the minimum required count towards the total chop count. One assumption is that UCCs must consist of more than one county, otherwise a chop of that county results in two chops instead of one, which may be excessive.

    Here's the map of VA UCCs.

    ()

    The pink areas don't depend on whether the independent cities (ICs) are merged into their counties or not. The numbers on those UCCs represent the minimum number of CDs to cover each of those UCCs, so an excess beyond that number creates extra chops. The orange area loses Dinwiddie county if ICs are not merged, but keeps it if Petersburg (32K) is merged into Dinwiddie.

    The multiple county rule comes into play when the Item 8 question of ICs is folded in. The tan clusters meet the standard if ICs are always separate, but become single counties if merged for ICs under 25K (Montgomery/Radford) or 50 K (Albemarle/Charlottesville, Frederick/Winchester). The yellow cluster (Roanoke/Roanoke&Salem) at 100K would also become a single county cluster. So mergers could cause these clusters to disappear as UCCs.

    The grey clusters would not be UCCs if ICs are separate. However, if their ICs merged they would qualify, but at that point they are just single county clusters. Augusta county has 13K (18%) urbanized and urbanized cities of 23K (Staunton) and 20K (Waynesboro). Campbell county has 17K (32%) urbanized and Lynchburg with 74K. Rockingham county has 18K (23%) urbanized and Harrisonburg with 49K. Washington county has 16K (28%) urbanized and Bristol with 18K.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 18, 2014, 11:36:59 PM
    The status of ICs under Item 8 also affect minority county clusters which is another community of interest. A black MCC consists of connected counties where the BVAP is 40% or or more. Chops of an MCC add to the chop count and discourage cracking the minority population in the MCC.

    A BVAP map of VA look like this, with the following key.
    yellow 25.0-33.3%
    lime 33.4-39.9%
    green 40.0%-49.9%
    dark green > 50.0%

    ()

    Contiguous counties across water without a bridge or ferry are not connected. If independent cities are all counted as counties then there are two clusters shown in medium green. If ICs are merged into their counties then the light green areas are added and there is only one large MCC.

    ()


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 20, 2014, 11:21:44 PM
    Nay on item 9


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 22, 2014, 10:31:27 PM

    Since no one else has joined in the discussion, I'd like to get your opinion X as to which elements in item 9 don't work. Is it either or both definitions or their application to the scoring?

    The work on county clusters emerged from a thread in 2013 (https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=175684.0) (especially the MI pull out linked on the first page) and evolved in another thread (https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=177731.0) (AL delves into minority communities of interest starting on page 4), leading to the final work on UCCs stickied on this board.

    The problem that was observed was that some urban areas that spanned counties were being split just to preserve county lines and it both ignored the natural community of interest of an urban center with its suburbs and tended to wash out medium sized urban vote centers by blending in lots of rural area. The problem in VRA states was to identify areas of counties dominated by a single minority interest to determine a community of interest that recognized race, but didn't make race the predominant factor in drawing a plan. The result from those threads was to identify clusters that could be objectively defined and represented a community of interest that should be given formal consideration in a redistricting plan.

    Also, did you have an opinion on Item 8?


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 23, 2014, 04:17:03 PM
    Hate to say it, but this is getting into really wanky territory. It makes it hard for us commissioners to understand.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Miles on December 23, 2014, 04:29:16 PM
    Hate to say it, but this is getting into really wanky territory. It makes it hard for us commissioners to understand.

    Seconded.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 23, 2014, 05:03:22 PM
    Hate to say it, but this is getting into really wanky territory. It makes it hard for us commissioners to understand.

    Seconded.

    Thirded

    Regarding number nine, my issue was with its application to scoring.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: jimrtex on December 24, 2014, 05:40:00 AM
    8A) Jimrtex suggested that most should be merged into their original counties which brings the three additional variations. His initial variation merges all but the 7 ICs with populations over 100K (Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Chesapeake, Richmond, Newport News, Alexandria, and Hampton), but that leaves the awkward case of Suffolk which has absorbed all of its county but is only 85K, and Portsmouth which is 95K but has no county to merge into since Chesapeake already took it all.
    My original rule would have included cities that had absorbed their original county; and cities with over 100,000 population.   So Suffolk is not an awkward case, while Virginia Beach, Hampton, and Newport News qualify under both criteria.   Portsmouth and Roanoke have at one time had over 100,000 population, so that you could conceivably have had a grandfather clause.  They certainly are of "county scale".   The median Virginia county is around 25,000.  You could make a reasonable case for them remaining "independent" of their county, other than them having spilled over into their surrounding county.

    8B) The next variation merges only those cities under 50K, which solves the above problem and also leaves Roanoke and Lynchburg acting as counties for redistricting purposes. Lynchburg is the smallest of these at 75K.
    In addition, the largest towns, Blacksburg and Leesburg are just below 50,000.  Lynchburg-Campbell County would remain a UCC.  I had originally set the threshold at 50,000, but had changed it to 100,000 to match the Bureau of Economic Analysis definition.  But it turns out that the BEA does not follow its own criteria in the case of Portsmouth and Roanoke (I was quite sure they must have 100,000 population, until I actually checked).

    8C) When we worked on urban areas last year the agreed standard for a county to be urban was for it to have at least 25K urbanized population or 40% urbanized. If the 25K population threshold is applied to ICs, then 6 more ICs would be treated as separate counties: Harrisonburg, Charlottesville, Danville, Manassas, Petersburg, and Winchester. The most important of these is Petersburg since is is overwhelmingly black and whether it is counted as independent or part of Dinwiddie county is likely to affect the scoring of plans dealing with the VRA district.
    A problem with this definition is that I deliberately included the surrounding counties when defining the UCC, because the independent cities included enough of the urban areas that the counties were being disqualified.   Yet, without the urbanized areas overlapping the city limit, the 50K threshold to be a metropolitan area would not be met.

    The independent cities proper are close 100% urbanized.  If they do have any open areas, very few persons live in them.

    The 40%/25K standard should really be read as:

    40% or more urban; or if less than 40% urban, at least 25K in urbanized areas.   While mathematically equivalent, the second version connotes the derivation as a county that is substantially (at minimum large plurality) urban or has a large urban presence (1/2 the population needed to qualify as a metropolitan area.

    You could also it formulate as:

    25K or more urban; or if less than 25K urban, 40% urban.  Mathematically accurate, but missing the point, and in this case, giving Charlottesville, Harrisonburg, and Danville a metropolitan status that they would not have without the surrounding county.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Chancellor Tanterterg on December 24, 2014, 06:57:23 AM
    I vote for 8C


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 26, 2014, 09:30:18 AM
    Fairfax county is the one county in VA that must have a macrochop. So, it will always need county subdivisions. I used the county GIS to produce this map showing the communities (CDPs) in the county as well as the red areas separate from the communities. The city and town lines on DRA match up with these areas and are the natural subunits for Fairfax. If ICs are merged into the county then Fairfax city and Falls Church would just be additional subunits.

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    As an example of chop counting I'll use Miles-A. Here's his plan for NoVa.

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    Fairfax county has 2 chops resulting in three CDs in the county.

    CD 10 has the smallest chop in Fairfax with a population of 10,045. It doesn't include all of a CDP, but the remainder is in two VTDs that span CDPs so there is no chop of the county subunit.

    CD 8 is the other chop with 368,013 (or 380,345 with Falls Church) and is large enough to be a macrochop. All the CDPs chopped between CD 8 and 11 are due to VTDs that span CDPs so there are no additional subunit chops.

    Prince William county is also chopped, and the smaller of the two districts is CD 10 with a population of 149,996 (or 202,090 if Manassas and Manassas Park are merged in). So this is also a macrochop. CDPs don't cover Prince William as completely as they do Fairfax, so some subdivision of the undesignated area would be useful. The simplest would be to use VTDs, in which case there can be no chops of the undesignated part of the county since DRA only maps at the level of VTDs.

    The total chop count in NoVa here is 3.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 26, 2014, 10:48:40 AM
    Let me continue to the southern end of Miles-A.

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    CD 3 has a chop of 80,107 in Henrico so its a macrochop. Within Henrico there is no chop of a CDP, so there is only the one chop.

    CD 7 has a chop of 56,374 in Richmond City so it's a macrochop. If the size was kept under 36,368 it wouldn't trigger the macrochop provisions, but let's look at what that does here. By taking the larger chop, neighborhood integrity now matters as much as county integrity in rural areas. The plan chops the Southside, West End and Northside (3,790 just over the microchop limit). As drawn without the benefit of the neighborhoods, it counts as 4 towards the CHOP score. However, it would be easy to put all the West End in CD 7, Southside in CD 3 and only chop Northside, reducing the chop count by 2 but keeping CD 3 BVAP at 50.4%.

    CD 7 has a chop of 36,947 in Chesterfield which is just over the threshold for a macrochop. However, there are no chopped CDPs, so there is only one chop.

    Neither Dinwiddie nor Prince George are chopped if ICs are considered equal to counties under Item 8. However, if either Item 8A, 8B, or 8C is adopted, putting Hopewell in CD 4 counts as a chop of Prince George. If either Item 8A or 8B is adopted (not 8C) then Dinwiddie is chopped by putting Petersburg in CD 3. Petersburg stays separate in 8C since its population is over 25K.

    CD 3 has a chop of 5,900 in James City county. The fact that CD 1 has two disconnected fragments in James City does not affect the CHOP score beyond the chop for CD 3.

    CD 2 has a macrochop of 106,560 in Norfolk City. As drawn the plan chops all five neighborhood areas within Norfolk it would gain 5 extra in the CHOP score. As with Richmond, it is easy to reduce the neighborhood chops to 1, and it actually increase BVAP for CD 3.

    So as drawn Miles-A scores 13 chops in the SE region as drawn. If the plan is modified to reflect neighborhoods in Richmond and Norfolk then the score drops to 7 in the SE region.

    CHOP scores depend on the treatment of ICs under Item 8. If ICs under 25K are merged into their counties for redistricting, the the score goes up by one. If ICs under 50K are merged it goes up 2. This example shows the types of districts that are affected by Item 8.





    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 26, 2014, 12:21:53 PM
    Finally, let me look at Miles-A from the state level and look at the potential impact of Item 9.

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    All the county and subunit chops are in the two areas of NoVa and SE, and if I use the fully independent version of Item 8 the CHOP score is 3+13 = 16 or it reduces to 10 with the aforementioned neighborhood changes.

    The urbanized area of NoVa that meets the definition of the UCC is covered by all or part of 5 CDs (1,7,8,10,11). It could be covered by as few as 4 so the score would increase to 17 if Item 9 were adopted. From a policy standpoint, this would say that it is preferable to keep Fredricksburg with the DC area, and for instance place the Williamsburg area with another CD in the SE unless it saves a county chop.

    The Hampton Roads UCC area can be covered by as few three CDs, but in Miles-A is covered by 4 (1,2,3,4). Having CD 1 run from Dale City to Williamsburg could be the cause, and it is the type of district that Item 9 tries to suppress. Then again, the extra CD could also be the result of VRA compliance, and then it isn't optional. Under Item 9 the CHOP is up to 18.

    The Richmond UCC can be covered by as few as 2 CDs, and in this plan there are 3 (3,4,7). The issue of Item 8 ICs does not affect Miles-A in this case. The VRA will tend to force a chop of this UCC. Like in large counties, some score increases may be unavoidable so under Item 9 the CHOP is up to 19.

    None of the other potential UCCs that depend on Item 8 are affected.

    The MCC originated to avoid cracking minority populations that span multiple counties and recognize them as a measurable community of interest. The goal is to discourage splits like the one here that puts Greensville and Brunswick in CD 5, unless it helps avoid chops elsewhere.

    If the ICs all remain independent under Item 8 then there are two in VA. If they are merged then there is just one larger MCC. If CVAP is used instead of VAP Norfolk and Hampton are added to the eastern MCC (and the unified one). So there are four options. IC separate+VAP, IC separate+CVAP, IC merged+VAP, and IC merged+CVAP. The last one is 96.6% of the quota so it is difficult to avoid a chop.

    IC separate+VAP: 3 CDs cover the western MCC and 2 CDs cover the eastern MCC for a total of 3 chops.

    IC separate+CVAP: 3 CDs cover the western MCC and 3 CDs cover the eastern MCC for a total of 4 chops.

    IC merged+VAP: 3 CDs cover the MCC for a total of 2 chops.

    IC merged+CVAP: 4 CDs cover the MCC for a total of 3 chops.

    The merged ICs avoid double counting some of the CDs in the chop count. However, the merged ICs would also increase the direct count for this plan. Without merged ICs under Item 9 the CHOP score would be 22 or 23. With merged ICs the CHOP score would range from 22 to 24.

    An important part of the Commission's work is setting the basic rules, even when it gets wonky. In a real commission I would expect more time to be spent on setting the criteria than on evaluating plans. Small changes do have an effect on the balance between different factors, so I hope this example helps guide which way the Commission wants to go.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 28, 2014, 02:08:23 AM
    Aye on Item 10.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 28, 2014, 07:42:16 AM

    What's your preference on Item 8, since some version is needed to score Item 10? As Miles-A illustrates in the SE region, the CHOP score depends on whether the ICs are merged into their counties or not.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on December 28, 2014, 09:08:01 AM
    Muon2, you should put all your items in one place, preferably perhaps at the start of the thread, so it can be easily found. I can't find your list at all anymore. I am wondering if it was accidentally deleted. A map of all the state highways that measure erosity might also be helpful, along with the map of the UC's  as defined by the agreed metric.  By the way, here (http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g392/swdunn1/Screenshot2014-12-27at111822AM_zpsbcc959eb.png) is a map of the border of the Hudson "urban cluster." Talk about erosity!  :P


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 28, 2014, 10:04:40 AM
    Muon2, you should put all your items in one place, preferably perhaps at the start of the thread, so it can be easily found. I can't find your list at all anymore. I am wondering if it was accidentally deleted. A map of all the state highways that measure erosity might also be helpful, along with the map of the UC's  as defined by the agreed metric.  By the way, here (http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g392/swdunn1/Screenshot2014-12-27at111822AM_zpsbcc959eb.png) is a map of the border of the Hudson "urban cluster." Talk about erosity!  :P

    I set up a separate thread to hold the approved items a while ago. I placed a link to that thread in the OP a couple of days ago since the items had moved to page 2 of the board. The unapproved items (8,9,10) aren't there yet. The difficulty seems to be that dealing with independent cities gets very technical, yet one can't construct a set of rules for VA without deciding if they are counties, subunits of counties, or either depending on the population.

    As your image shows, erosity is not a constraint for the Census Bureau. That's why we look at whole political units as a cluster.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on December 28, 2014, 10:53:53 AM
    Muon2, you should put all your items in one place, preferably perhaps at the start of the thread, so it can be easily found. I can't find your list at all anymore. I am wondering if it was accidentally deleted. A map of all the state highways that measure erosity might also be helpful, along with the map of the UC's  as defined by the agreed metric.  By the way, here (http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g392/swdunn1/Screenshot2014-12-27at111822AM_zpsbcc959eb.png) is a map of the border of the Hudson "urban cluster." Talk about erosity!  :P

    I set up a separate thread to hold the approved items a while ago. I placed a link to that thread in the OP a couple of days ago since the items had moved to page 2 of the board. The unapproved items (8,9,10) aren't there yet. The difficulty seems to be that dealing with independent cities gets very technical, yet one can't construct a set of rules for VA without deciding if they are counties, subunits of counties, or either depending on the population.

    As your image shows, erosity is not a constraint for the Census Bureau. That's why we look at whole political units as a cluster.

    Perhaps you should sticky it Muon 2, along with helpful maps of urban clusters, and ideally, state highways. I have no idea where it is.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 28, 2014, 12:31:32 PM
    Muon2, you should put all your items in one place, preferably perhaps at the start of the thread, so it can be easily found. I can't find your list at all anymore. I am wondering if it was accidentally deleted. A map of all the state highways that measure erosity might also be helpful, along with the map of the UC's  as defined by the agreed metric.  By the way, here (http://i1099.photobucket.com/albums/g392/swdunn1/Screenshot2014-12-27at111822AM_zpsbcc959eb.png) is a map of the border of the Hudson "urban cluster." Talk about erosity!  :P

    I set up a separate thread to hold the approved items a while ago. I placed a link to that thread in the OP a couple of days ago since the items had moved to page 2 of the board. The unapproved items (8,9,10) aren't there yet. The difficulty seems to be that dealing with independent cities gets very technical, yet one can't construct a set of rules for VA without deciding if they are counties, subunits of counties, or either depending on the population.

    As your image shows, erosity is not a constraint for the Census Bureau. That's why we look at whole political units as a cluster.

    Perhaps you should sticky it Muon 2, along with helpful maps of urban clusters, and ideally, state highways. I have no idea where it is.

    As you initially suggested I had placed it at the top of this thread by means of a link (does the link not work?). I want to limit the stickies since the board has plenty of other active threads. I plan to have another linked thread for plan submissions once the rules are finalized. I do have the sticky thread for jimrtex's UCCs which has been up since 2013, but that is up for debate in the context of the ICs in VA. If this goes well and interest is there for other states, I would provide a more permanent reference for the rules.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on December 28, 2014, 04:20:06 PM
    OK, thanks, I see. You planning on fleshing out your definition of "erosity" to get in your state highway proxy concept? I don't see the arithmetic difference between a competitive and highly competitive CD. Should not a competitive CD have a .75 score plus or minus, as opposed to 1.0? 


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on December 28, 2014, 04:48:21 PM
    OK, thanks, I see. You planning on fleshing out your definition of "erosity" to get in your state highway proxy concept? I don't see the arithmetic difference between a competitive and highly competitive CD. Should not a competitive CD have a .75 score plus or minus, as opposed to 1.0? 

    I didn't want to overload the commission with erosity measures until the IC/chop issues were dealt with. So, yes we'll get to my connectivity-based measure for erosity.

    Highly competitive districts (those of PVI 0 or 1) don't add to either political measure. Uncompetitive districts add twice as much to polarization, but they don't double penalize a plan on skew. In part that would be double counting. I also wanted to make all the scores based on simple integers for clear comparisons.


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: morgieb on December 28, 2014, 05:34:37 PM

    What's your preference on Item 8, since some version is needed to score Item 10? As Miles-A illustrates in the SE region, the CHOP score depends on whether the ICs are merged into their counties or not.
    I tend to prefer Item 8A, but I suspect I'm a bit idiosyncratic there.....


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: Torie on December 28, 2014, 06:24:05 PM
    OK, thanks, I see. You planning on fleshing out your definition of "erosity" to get in your state highway proxy concept? I don't see the arithmetic difference between a competitive and highly competitive CD. Should not a competitive CD have a .75 score plus or minus, as opposed to 1.0? 

    I didn't want to overload the commission with erosity measures until the IC/chop issues were dealt with. So, yes we'll get to my connectivity-based measure for erosity.

    Highly competitive districts (those of PVI 0 or 1) don't add to either political measure. Uncompetitive districts add twice as much to polarization, but they don't double penalize a plan on skew. In part that would be double counting. I also wanted to make all the scores based on simple integers for clear comparisons.


    I didn't notice that highly uncompetitive districts get a 2 rather than a 1 for the merely "competitive," as opposed to the "highly" uncompetitive. I will have to reread your text. I do approve that competitiveness just acts as a tie breaker. Ugly gerrymanders to effect competitiveness offends my "artistic" side when it comes to maps. Art rules!  :)


    Title: Re: Forum Redistricting Commission
    Post by: muon2 on January 02, 2015, 06:00:43 AM
    I'm not sure if this process can be resurrected, but here's the current status of items before the commission.

    Item 8 (on ICs as counties). Jerry (alt) aye on 8, X aye on 8C, morgieb aye on 8A. So there's no concurrence yet. It's a unique feature of VA and scoring can't happen without it. Should we use ranked voting here?

    Item 9 (on county clusters). X nay on their use in scoring. The miles-A example shows some of the tradeoffs this would force mappers to consider.

    Item 10 (on chops). morgieb aye. I've put out a pretty detailed example of how it works, so I don't know what else could help the commission decide if this is fine or they want changes.