jimrtex
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« Reply #2 on: April 04, 2010, 12:41:05 AM » |
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« Edited: April 04, 2010, 02:10:33 PM by jimrtex »
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There are 150 districts. A county entitled to more than one representative, must have an the full number of districts possible contained wholly within the county. Any surplus may be combined with whole counties or surpluses of other large counties to form a single district. For example 24 districts would be wholly contained in Harris County, 3 districts wholly within Fort Bend County, and one district would be formed from a portion of Harris County and a portion of Fort Bend County.
There is one violation of the Texas Constitution, necessary to comply with one man, one vote requirements of the US Constitution. Ellis County, south of Dallas is entitled to about 9/10 of a representative. Combining it with Hill County (which is the 2000 district) makes it too large. So a small portion of Ellis County would be combined with a large surplus from Dallas County to form a 15th district in Ellis County.
Numbers represent whole districts within a county. A "+" indicates a surplus combined with adjoining counties. Bexar County is very close to exactly 10 districts, and so they are wholly contained within the county. A "o" represents a county that is entitled to more than 1/2 of a district. A "*" represents a county entitled to more than 3/10 of a district or is the largest county in a district.
The census estimates for 2009, 2008, 2007, and 2006 are used. These have not been projected to 2010.
The ideal district size is 165,200 up from 139,000 in 2000. 28 (of 254) counties grew faster than the state average, all in the the 4 major metropolitan areas, except Bell (Temple-Killeen), Hidalgo (McAllen), and Webb (Laredo). Only 3 counties in the larger metropolitan areas lagged the state average: Dallas, Galveston, and Bexar (just slightly).
Overall gains for decade: DFW (+2.0), Houston (+1.6), Austin (1.4), Mid-Lower Rio Grande (0.5), San Antonio (0.3).
The following shows the deviation from the ideal (it is optimistic, since it assumes that the districts in multi-district counties will have equal population). This may be true in the most extreme cases, where there may not be too much variation without individual districts being outside the generally accepted maximum deviation of 5%. For example, in the 2 Brazoria+Matagorda district, the larger can be at most 760 persons larger than the smaller (or about 0.46% of the total).
In the 28 Harris+Fort Bend districts, you could conceivably have as much variation as + or - minus 8200 between districts, but you would probably run into VRA concerns. States have relied on + or - 5% as a safe harbor when complying with one man, one vote requirements of legislative districts, and things such as respecting county lines. When there are no county lines involved, such a deviation might be questioned, especially if there were a systematic bias, or even if the distribution were non normal.
4.5-5.0%: 2 (Brazoria)
4.0-4.5%:
3.5-4.0%:
3.0-3.5%: 1
2.0-2.5%: 3
1.5-2.0%: 7
1.0-1.5%: 4
0.5-1.0%: 5
0.0-0.5%: 39
0.0-0.5%: 57
0.5-1.0%: 9
1.0-1.5%:
1.5-2.0%: 12 (Tarrant 11)
2.0-2.5%: 3
2.5-3.0%:
3.0-3.5%:
3.5-4.0%:
4.0:4.5%: 3 (Galveston 2, Grayson 1)
4.5-.50%:
Major changes from 2008 to 2009 are primarily due to growth in suburban areas forcing rearrangements of counties in the surrounding area. In particular it was possible to share a district between Travis and Williamson counties; Harris and Fort Bend counties; and Tarrant County was forced to be by itself.
This freed up a substantial population in West Texas, though most of it was in the eastern fringe in Wise County, and the Hill Country. By adding in Val Verde County, it was possible to create a 13th district in West Texas.
9 of the districts in West Texas have to be anchored with a larger county: Potter (Amarillo), Randall (Amarillo), Lubbock (Lubbock) (2), Ector (Odessa), Midland (Midland), Tom Green (San Angelo), Taylor (Abilene), and Wichita (Wichita Falls), because those counties have a population equivalent to between 1/2 and 1 representative, which must be contained in a single district, but can not be placed in the same district as another larger county. In the case of Lubbock County, its population is between that needed for 1.5 and 2 representatives, so there is one district within the county, and another combining the remainder of the county and adjacent counties. The other 4 districts are made up of smaller counties.
In the 2009 map the added district is the green district running from the Hill Country to the Val Verde (Del Rio). Along with the continued expansion of the El Paso based district into the Trans-Pecos and beyond, this forced the Odessa, Midland, San Angelo, and Abilene districts northward. As the Amarillo and Lubbock districts expand eastward, it forced the eastern panhandle district southward, which meant that the other rural district lurched eastward and included Wise County on the northwest fringe of the DFW area.
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