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Ohio Redistricting Advisory Board Members
Dan Tokaji, Election Law @ Moritz at the Ohio State University
Stephen Brooks, Bliss Institute at the University of Akron
Meg Flack, League of Women Voters of Ohio
Sam Gresham, Common Cause/Ohio
Jocelyn Travis, NAACP
Jim Slagle, Ohio Campaign for Accountable Redistricting
Catherine Turcer, Ohio Citizen Action
Kellye Pinkleton, former Director, Voting Rights Institute
Citizen produce fair maps
Official maps score last!
Our citizen competition resulted in 53 congressional maps and a dozen state legislative maps, each prepared – using the same population and election data used by public officials.
Plans were scored by objective criteria: preserving county boundaries; compactness; competitiveness; and representational fairness. And guess what? The citizen maps outscored the official maps by a wide margin. In fact, the lowest scoring map of all, was the map which the Governor approved on Sept. 26 to establish our new congressional districts for the next decade! More
The competition maps split fewer counties and cities apart, and created districts which were more compact and politically balanced.
While the politicians made many excuses as to why they created so many one-sided districts with contorted shapes, the truth is they did it for one reason — politics. Instead of creating districts which would reflect the will of the voters, they created districts which gave maximum political advantage to the political party in power.
Congrats to Mike Fortner and Tim Clarke for creating the top scoring state legislative maps.
Click here to see their maps and information about their plans
Congrats to Mike Fortner, Tim Clarke, and Glenn Jacques for creating the top scoring congressional maps.
Congrats to Chris Buchanan and Charles Fortner for the top student maps.
Click here to see their maps and information about their plans.
For more information:
Contact: Jim Slagle, Manager
Ohio Campaign for Accountable Redistricting
85 E. Gay St. #713, Columbus, Ohio 43215
614-221-6077
jslagle@drawthelinemidwest.org
Tim Clarke, one of the 2009 redistricting competition winners
Designed by Firefly Partners
[...] Also – if you think you can do as good or a better job than our state legislators in redrawing the congressional districts for Ohio, check out the Draw The Line contest here. [...]
Because Ohio is divided into counties that represent much of what we do, why not use contiguous counties that would have equal population totals? Some districts would have more counties than others, but already some districts are larger than others in area.
Why not simply draw 10 mile squares and be done with it. As noted above, we already have districts that are larger than others. These crazy lines all over the place and disconnected districts is a mess. The area should determine the district, not party lines.
[...] Henkener of the League of Women Voters of Ohio shared information about the Ohio Redistricting Competition and provided context for the hearing, “As we sit here in Columbus, the state’s capital, we are [...]
The U.S. Constitution does not require “Congressional Districts”, so why not just put the 16 seats up for statewide vote? The top 16 vote-getters go to Washington.
Third and fourth-party voters might finally have a shot at having their voices heard in Washington.
End the two-party duopoly!
There ought to be a state constitutional amendment specifying that ALL districts used in electing representatives, either state or federal, be as circular as possible, the narrowest distance not to exceed 75% of the widest distance across the district(the state’s exterior boundaries allowing, and that the commission assigned the duty of drawing the districts be 1)elected by the public from a sworn, non-partisan ballot and 2)forbidden to have knowledge of or access to any demographic information as to the political nature of any voters living in any given location.
They tried that as an Ohio constitutional amendment a few censuses ago. The pols shot it down.
[...] News, by admin Tweet wordpress plugins and themesMARION — “The 2011 Ohio Redistricting Competition invites people to draw district lines for the Ohio House and Senate and the U.S. House of [...]
[...] a competition was launched that gives private citizens access to the same census and election data used by the [...]
How much bandwidth do you need to draw a map? I have 10 mbps, and it’s not nearly enough. Half the time I can’t even log in or download the program. Even when I can download it, it takes forever to transfer areas, or they can’t be moved at all-they just turn red. Is it my internet speed, or am I doing something else wrong?
The solution is simple. Divide the state into n number of districts such that the population is equally divided between each district and the total length of the borders is minimum.
No specific amount of bandwidth is required to draw a map. The processing work takes place at the main server, not the individual user’s computer. Within the past few days additional memory was added to the main server and the software was reconfigured. This has increased processing speed and helped reduce delays caused by multiple users. A few users have recently reported some districts inadvertently locking (turning red). The software experts are addressing this issue. Users having this problem should send an e-mail to jslagle@ohiocitizen.org which includes the plan name so that this bug can be eliminated.
My computer anti-virus software says this site is not safe and not to download. Has someone who doesn’t like this idea hacked into it and installed a virus???
The website is completely safe. A valid security certificate is available. However, some operating systems misidentify the certificate. This occurs because District Builders is housed on a single server. However, regardless of the security warning displayed, this will not endanger the user’s computer or effect operation.
For a technical explanation see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Name_Indication
[...] that have banded together to seek fair, accountable and nonpartisan redistricting by visiting http://drawthelinemidwest.org/ohio/competition/. It is crucial that we work to draw districts that are as competitive as possible, are compact, [...]
Barbara — the website is completely safe. No one has hacked it. However, you only get optimal performance if you are using Mozilla Firefox as your web browser (free download available on site). If you use Internet Explorer you will get the security warning and not all features of the site will work.
I’m getting the security warning and I’m using Mozilla Firefox. Is something wrong? Thanks.
Anne — the site is completely safe. Am contacting you by e-mail to attempt to diagnose why your computer is providing this warning. Thx.
Even though the website is completely safe and a valid security certificate is available, some operating systems misidentify the certificate. This occurs because District Builders is housed on a single server. However, regardless of the security warning displayed, this will not endanger the user’s computer or effect operation.
For a technical explanation see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Server_Name_Indication
[...] League of Women Voters has undertaken the “Draw the Line” competitionwhich allows the people to redistrict the State’s political landscape in much the same way as [...]
I’ve got my map ready to publish, but I can’t seem to be able share it. When I go to the share tab and and enter the name of my map, it says that the name is already in use and that I need a unique name. Is there anyway I can share it or copy it to a shared map? Or do I have to start from scratch?
Thanks John. No need to start from scratch. Just give your map a new name and share it.
[...] cycle by developing redistricting savvy citizens. Organizations in Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Ohio are all hosting redistricting competitions to bring citizens into the redistricting fold and [...]
[...] in Politics Project: “Recently the [Money in Politics Project] kicked off a contest for the public to redraw the district lines used by the Ohio to determine representatives to the State’s Congress to encourage the [...]
[...] Avon Lake. The winning maps will be submitted to the Ohio Apportionment Board. The group’s Congressional redistricting competition is still ongoing. Fortner said he considers redistricting a hobby, which prompted his decision to [...]
Well, it’s here. The Repubs came out with their new Congressional district map today. Read it and weep!
http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/5095210
[...] the special master will consider incorporating elements from one of the 53 plans submitted to the Ohio Redistricting Competition — all of which scored better on compactness, minimizing county splits, partisan fairness, and [...]
[...] the special master will consider incorporating elements from one of the 53 plans submitted to the Ohio Redistricting Competition — all of which scored better on compactness, minimizing county splits, partisan fairness, and [...]
[...] the special master will consider incorporating elements from one of the 53 plans submitted to the Ohio Redistricting Competition — all of which scored better on compactness, minimizing county splits, partisan fairness, and [...]
[...] the special master will consider incorporating elements from one of the 53 plans submitted to the Ohio Redistricting Competition — all of which scored better on compactness, minimizing county splits, partisan fairness, and [...]
Thanks , I have recently been looking for info about this topic for ages and yours is the greatest I have found out so far. But, what about the bottom line? Are you sure concerning the source?
The number of organizations that are involved in CAR (Campaign for
Accountable Redistricting) is most impressive. From what I heard over NPR
CAR wants to start a petition drive to put their congressional map on the
ballot in 2012. I am very much in favor of such efforts. However, I do not
see how that is possible until the present referendum effort to defeat HB
319 is successful. Is CAR backing the present petition drive?
If so, how are they backing it?
I know from experience of having gathered hundreds of petition signatures
for the SB5, HB194, and now HB319, the hard work that is required to do
serious petitioning. My support base in gathering signatures has been the
Delaware County Democrat Party and the We Are Ohio. These groups know how to
get get out the troops to do the hard work required.
You may know something I do not, but it seems to me that unless and until HB
319 is overturned all the efforts of CAR will come to nothing. If you ever
get to the point where a CAR congressional map is drawn up will they have
the organization and the troops ready to do the hard slogging work of
getting enough petitions signed? As you know, ballot initiatives require
over 360,000 valid signatures of registered voters. The present petition
drive to overturn HB 319 only requires 231,000 signatures of registered
voters. Given these realities what is CAR’s game plan beyond simply drawing
up a congressional map?
Our proposed constitutional amendment to reform Ohio’s redistricting process is different than the proposed referendum to repeal HB 319 (new congressional districts). Our proposed constitutional amendment would change the way redistricting is done. The referendum would only repeal HB 319 and then send the issue back to the Legislature to draw new districts (probably not much better than 319). See the Reform tab on our home page for more info about the proposed constitutional amendment.
We are currently working with partners to attempt to secure the necessary resources to mobilize this effort — a daunting, but not insurmountable task. Stay tuned.
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