Andy Driscoll says: "But, as a former St. Paul Charter Commissioner who redistricted his own city wards, I have to question the wisdom of No. 2 (which should be unnecessary if No. 1 were to go into effect). Allowing cities to redistrict before the state does could create real chaos in the already confusing overlapping of legislative, ward and precinct boundaries at the municipal level.
If the same general population distribution rules apply at all levels, the cities ward and precinct boundaries should follow, not precede, the legislative redistricting process since the state's plan always supercedes local lines." Ward lines don't have to follow legislative lines, although precincts can't be divided between legislative districts -- or wards. If there happened to be a few precincts that had to be reconfigured, it is easy for the city councils to do. Precincts don't have to be equal in size, so the council could just change the lines. In fact, precincts in Mpls changed a few years ago to save costs in elections. The council decided that each ward would have only ten precincts (the exception, I believe, is ward 12, which also has the VA precinct). At one time, the fifth ward actually had 19 precincts! In my district, two fifth-ward precincts were combined and two third-ward precincts were combined. This is a process that does not need to be done in concert with redistricting because of census. linda higgins old highland REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
