Berks-Chester-Lancaster Division

[jimrtex]

Berks, Chester, and Lancaster have population sufficient for two congressional districts (a tiny sliver of Chester is attached to Delaware, to give the remainder of the Philadelphia metro 5 districts).

Dividing three large counties (Lancaster 0.736 quotas; Chester 0.707; Berks 0.583) into two districts requires a major chop of one, while keeping the other two whole. In essence, we are choosing the best victim. In dividing Berks or Lancaster, an attempt was made to keep their largest population center, Reading or Lancaster city, respectively whole.

You may pretend you are from one of the three counties (e.g. if you have a beard or like red, you can be from Lancaster; if your are a berk or like to ride, you can be from Berks; and if you like walls or walk with a limp, you can be from Chester).

This is approval voting, and you can vote for up to four maps.

Split Chester



Split Berks, Reading with Chester



Split Berks, Reading with Lancaster



Split Lancaster, Lancaster city with Chester



Split Lancaster, Lancaster city with Berks

[Torie]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

[morgieb]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

Not necessarily. Philly seats take a slight slice out of Montco, PA-7 to take a chunk out of Philly, and PA-6 can remain a Chester/Berks seat.

[muon2]

The Chester chop adds one to the UCC cover, but also produces the lowest erosity in a plan like this.

[Torie]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

Not necessarily. Philly seats take a slight slice out of Montco, PA-7 to take a chunk out of Philly, and PA-6 can remain a Chester/Berks seat.

Yes, I see what Jimrtex is doing now. In lieu of PA-06 chopping into Montco to take in Lower Pottsgrove, he is going to have a Philly CD chop into Montco and take Lower Moreland, plus maybe Bryn Athyn. That is a reasonable chop, provided that the deeper chop into Philly by PA-07 does not entail chopping a ward.

[jimrtex]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

Bucks and Montgomery are equivalent to two districts.

I am not using the current districts, so PA-06 is meaningless.

Arguably, Philadelphia and Delaware are equivalent to three districts, so the sliver of Chester that I have shown does not matter.

[Torie]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

Bucks and Montgomery are equivalent to two districts.

I am not using the current districts, so PA-06 is meaningless.

Arguably, Philadelphia and Delaware are equivalent to three districts, so the sliver of Chester that I have shown does not matter.

Whatever. I am calling you CD PA-06. Call it what you want. Sooner or later you will finish your map, and it will either have sub-jurisdiction chops or not. The size of your chop into Chester by your Delco dominated CD affects the shape of the lines of the CD options that you drew, so I assume that is a final. If not, the exercise is flawed, because your lines are not final.

[jimrtex]

PA-06 is going to need to punch into Montco, to equalize populations. Have you accounted for that?

Bucks and Montgomery are equivalent to two districts.

I am not using the current districts, so PA-06 is meaningless.

Arguably, Philadelphia and Delaware are equivalent to three districts, so the sliver of Chester that I have shown does not matter.

Whatever. I am calling you CD PA-06. Call it what you want. Sooner or later you will finish your map, and it will either have sub-jurisdiction chops or not. The size of your chop into Chester by your Delco dominated CD affects the shape of the lines of the CD options that you drew, so I assume that is a final. If not, the exercise is flawed, because your lines are not final.

I assume you mean a Montco district? Or do you mean Montgomery-Berks-Lebanon?

[publicunofficial]

I'd say option 1 and option 4 are the best.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

In terms of preference:
1. Option 2
2. Option 4
3. Option 3
4. Option 1
5. Option 5

[TJ in Oregon]

I think splitting Chester is the best option because even though you chop the UCC, each of Lancaster and Berks Counties is a more coherent community of interest than Chester County is, chopping Chester is less mangled-looking, and it also means you don't have to deal with the distorted games of trying to figure out where to put Reading and Lancaster City without it becoming an egregious partisan gerrymander.

[politicallefty]

I've drawn Pennsylvania many times and Chester tends to get split virtually ever time, so I'm partial to that option. However, I can also see the merits of splitting Berks and putting Reading in with Chester. So, I'd say I'm leaning towards option 1 with option 2 being a close second.

I think the Lancaster splits are awful and I don't think Reading belongs with Lancaster.

[morgieb]

I think 1 looks the cleanest, but I could live with either of the Berks split.

If I'm putting my partisan hat on then 2 FTW!

[jimrtex]

I had suggested that the voters (or a sample of them) could choose the map that they would like. So you might choose 1000 voters, and give each of them five maps that would represent the district they would be assigned to. They would then rank them.

I assume most voters would dislike the division of their county, and that this would be particularly strong in Lancaster and Berks, both which should consider themselves as being outside Philadelphia. Those in Chester might be a little opposed to division since they may be oriented toward Philadelphia, rather than a Chester County identity. Some of Chester connects through Montgomery, other connects through Delaware, and the Amish areas spill over from Lancaster.

Lancaster would dominate any district that it was kept whole in, so they might divide fairly evenly between (1) Lancaster + Western Chester; (2) Lancaster + Northern Berks; (3) Lancaster + Reading.  (1) and (3) are physically compact. (2) Might appeal to those who consider Lancaster a rural county. (4) and (5) would be ranked last.

Berks would choose between (1) Berks + North/East Chester; (4) Berks + northern Lancaster; (5) Berks + Lancaster city. They might not overwhelmingly oppose to (2) placing Reading with Chester.

Chester would likely prefer (2) Chester + Reading; and (4) Chester + Lancaster city. The alternative divisions of Berks (3) and Lancaster (5) are more ungainly. Some Chester voters might like the relatively compact districts of (1).

Hypothetical Condorcet rankings:

(2) 4-0
(3) 3-1
(1) 2-2
(4) 1-3
(5) 0-4

In head to head, (2) is overwhelmingly preferred over (3). Since (2) was the preference of Atlas voters as well, it will be used.