We're in New Voting Districts! What That Means for MorningSide
For the next ten years, we’ll be voting for candidates in all-new districts for the state legislature and Congress. While that means changes that can be confusing and disruptive right now, it will actually give our votes more clout for decades to come.
This year, every state must design new maps of voting districts, based on the latest census. In Michigan and elsewhere, it’s been a shameful process, where the party in power ”gerrymandered” the districts into absurd shapes solely to keep itself in power. We got crazy districts like the 14th congressional, which extended all the way from Pontiac to Grosse Pointe Woods and Southwest Detroit. But no more.
For the first time ever, thanks to voter approval of Prop 2 in 2018, we will be going to the polls in districts designed not by politicians, but by a balanced group of Democratic, Republican, and Independent citizens. The redistricting was done out in the open, with constant input from voters. As this Citizens Commission worked for months on one set of draft maps after another, citizens viewed the maps online, gave the Commission nearly 30,000 comments, and submitted our own maps. We could also speak up at hearings held across the state.
Trying to keep neighborhoods together as “Communities of Interest”
Some Morningside residents joined with East English Village (EEV) volunteers to hand in maps showing the “communities of interest,” (COIs) that matter to us. COIs are areas where people are connected to each other and should be in the same district. The Morningside neighborhood is such a community, and volunteers thought it should be united with the EEV and Cornerstone neighborhoods, since we cooperate on projects and mutual support.
So how did it work out?
It comes as no surprise that not everyone is happy, Politicians are losing safe districts, and many face stiff competition in general elections, not just primaries. Voters will have to get to know a whole new slate of candidates. And the online process was not as easy to access and use as it should be. But once the dust settles, the new districts should give voters a better chance to have our votes count. If half the people vote Democratic, for example, there’s a much better chance that half their representatives will be Democratic.
How MorningSide fares
Because our new Congressional district is not so stretched out, it will be easier for our Representative to pay attention to Detroit neighborhoods.
And we are united with EEV and Cornerstone in State Senate District 10. It stretches up to Utica Road, but is more compact than our old District 1, which reached from Gilbralter to St. Clair Shores. The new Senate districts are fairer to both parties than the old ones, which heavily favored Republicans.
As for the new State House districts, they have come under heavy fire. They unfairly favor Republicans, says a NextVote analysis. The House maps also unfairly split up 24 Communities of Interest, which is much worse than the maps we had before. Morningside is split up between districts 9 and 11, and so is EEV.
Black Leaders Sue Over Maps
Part of the Redistricting Commission’s task was also to stop ”packing” most voters of color into just a few districts, which had been done by politicians as a kind of political segregation, to limit black clout.
But community leaders said the Commission went too far, and almost left us with no majority-black districts at all. After citizens spoke out strongly against this, especially at October and December hearings in Detroit, some changes were made. But not enough, say the Detroit Caucus of the Michigan Legislature and the black community leaders who are now suing to get the maps redone.
Messy - but a big improvement
We’re also seeing public divisions within the Commission itself, and it all looks messy. But let’s keep in mind that this has never been done before, and they’re all rookies. Also, the work was more rushed than planned, because census figures came in late.
But the bottom line is that we are getting districts that are much fairer than anything we’ve had before in Michigan – or in most other states.
If you look at states where district designers don’t even have to try to be fair, voters are being outrageously manipulated. In North Carolina, for example, the Republican legislature is drawing distorted maps that could give 11 of the state’s 14 Congressional seats to Republicans. Yet about half the voters are Democrats.
That won’t happen here. The Commission is now asking the public to tell them how they can improve the process at www.Michigan.gov/MICRC.