Chicago's "Shady" Ward Remap

Is the "Chicago Way" of re-mapping the ward fair or even legal? Why are ward boundries based on politics and not on an even number of people in each ward so each vote really counts? Personally, I like the 25 Ward/city of Chicago map drawn up based on population numbers.

One person, one vote? Not in Chicago's new ward remap | Greg Hinz | Crain's Chicago Business


Lipstick on a pig is artistry compared to that once-in-a-decade horror known as legislative reapportionment.

The new maps that lawmakers roll out after consulting with their computers and cartographers usually look like your kitchen wall after a food fight: lots of gooey globs and squiggles and messy drippings. I understand why, given that a remap at its core is about survival and screwing the other guys, not aesthetics.


Read more of Greg Hinz on his blog.
That said, even remapping has rules, like one person, one vote. The idea is that, after 10 years of population shifts, the new map yields districts that contain roughly the same population. But Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the Chicago City Council seem ready to violate those fundamentals, big time.

The proposed City Council map that African-American aldermen and Mr. Emanuel's council allies released a couple of days before Christmas would partially disenfranchise the North and Northwest sides and overly franchise most of the South and West sides. It would do so by packing white voters into wards with extra-large populations and spreading black voters among wards with significantly fewer residents.

If that sounds like reverse discrimination, it may well be. It certainly constitutes old-time, follow-the-mayor power politics. Whatever, there's no other way to describe a map in which North Side lakefront wards will have nearly 56,000 residents each, but most predominantly black wards only 51,500 or so.

That kind of deviation is quite possibly illegal. But Mr. Ema-nuel, who wants to avoid a nasty referendum over dueling maps, is backing it, at least tacitly.

The core problem is that Chicago's African-American population plummeted in the past decade, decreasing by a jaw-dropping 181,453, or about 18%. In comparison, all other racial and ethnic groups collectively held about even. Like it or not, that would suggest that the new map will include fewer black wards, with the growing Latino population picking up some.

Instead, the word has come down from the mayor's office to work out something with African-American aldermen who might be out of a job. So Mr. Emanuel's council team is pushing a map in which the 44th Ward in Lakeview would have 55,888 residents, while the 3rd Ward on the South Side would be home to 51,613. The 38th Ward near O'Hare International Airport would have 56,001 residents, but the 37th Ward a couple of miles to the south would have just 51,530.

Some are squawking.

“This move is a complete step backwards,” says Lincoln Park Alderman Michele Smith (43rd), whose area would be divided into five chunks. “Lincoln Park was one of the first wards to recover in the "50s and "60s because it had strong aldermen and strong community groups. This destroys that.” Defending this map in court could cost more than a referendum, she adds.

Other Rahm backers offer an interesting range of explanations.

They include Alderman Joe Moore (49th), who may want Mr. Emanuel to appoint his wife to his council seat if he gets a big state job. “I could live with either map,” he says, referring to an alternate plan offered by Hispanic aldermen.

They also include Alderman Harry Osterman (48th), who says the equal population thing “is going to be discussed at a lot of hearings,” and Tom Tunney (44th), who says he's “comfortable with either map” and predicts a compromise.

Compromise is good—particularly if it involves some of the old Southwest Side ward bosses making way for Latinos moving their way. But it's not right to create a phantom black ward by stretching population.

Now, it's true the consensus 2000 ward map had different populations, too. But the excuse then was that public housing was being rebuilt in a few black wards and any under-population there was temporary. Even if that excuse doesn't hold up, 2000 was still in the cartographic dark ages. Illinois' new congressional map has a diversion of exactly one—yes, one—voter, with the state's 18 districts having either 712,813 or 712,812 residents. New General Assembly districts are just as even.

Mr. Emanuel needs to take a good, post-holiday look at this. Avoiding a needless referendum fight is one thing. Caving in to a blatantly unfair map is another. Chicago expects more from our new mayor.



Read more: http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20111231/ISSUE05/312319966/one-person-one-vote-not-in-chicagos-new-ward-remap#ixzz1iR21qeIa
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