Va. Redistricting Commission votes to allow use of political data, reject university map-drawers
The most revealing moment of the Virginia Redistricting Commission’s meeting Tuesday may have come during a bathroom break.
With microphones still on and broadcasting to a live stream, Sen. George Barker, D-Fairfax, huddled with Democratic citizen commissioner Brandon Hutchins, who seemed concerned the commission was setting itself up for public blowback by not living up to its promise of a fairer redistricting process.
“They are going to bomb us for this,” Hutchins said.
“Actually, they won’t,” said Barker. “It’s actually a fairly small segment of the public that is working on this issue. … There’ll be some complaints here and there. There always are.”
Time will tell whose prediction is correct. But a series of decisions the commission made Tuesday offer the clearest picture yet of the role politics will continue to play in a process formerly handled entirely by legislators in the General Assembly who were effectively empowered to draw their own districts.
Read more: https://www.virginiamercury.com/2021/08/17/va-redistricting-commission-votes-to-allow-use-of-political-data-reject-university-map-drawers/
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Is holding public hearings to listen to the people as they go to a non political commission we voted for, overwhelmingly!
