Additional rules for drawing council district boundaries

In addition to the established criteria, the commission shall also adhere to the following criteria in establishing boundaries of the council districts: (1) Council districts shall have approximately equal, permanent, resident populations, as required by applicable constitutional provisions to prevent vote dilution to the maximum degree practicable. (2) Nonresident military personnel, nonresident military dependents, nonresident students, and foreign nationals or aliens shall be excluded from the permanent, resident population base used to calculate each proposed council district’s population and its deviations from an ideal council district’s population, if practicable. (3) An ideal council district’s population number shall be used to determine by what percentage each council district’s population deviates from the population of an ideal council district. (4) The number of council districts to which a region is entitled shall be determined by adding together the permanent resident population according to the United States census for the applicable United States census year within each region and dividing that number by an ideal council district’s population. (A) Fractional portions of such districts shall be rounded to the nearest integer to determine the number of council districts required for that region. (B) Numbers from 0.10 to 0.49 shall be rounded down to the nearest integer. Numbers from 0.50 to 0.99 shall be rounded up to the nearest integer. (5) There shall be no partisanship or racism in drawing council district boundaries. (6) No council district shall be drawn to unduly favor or penalize an incumbent. (7) Council district boundaries shall be drawn without regard to any incumbent’s residential location, any incumbent’s ability to run for re-election in that incumbent’s current council district, or whether any incumbent faces another incumbent for re-election. (8) Community of interest or community of common interest shall be respected and be kept together in the plan, if practicable. (9) Council districts shall be drawn to be as compact as practicable while maintaining the community or communities of interest. (10) The County shall use to the extent possible a reasonably current computer mapping program and shall make the program accessible to the public, if practicable. (11) All parts of each council district shall be contiguous to the council district and be reachable by roads internal to the council district. (12) There shall be no gerrymandering for any reason. (13) The drawing of bizarre council district shapes shall be avoided even if a previous plan was designed using an odd, unusual, or illogical shape. (14) There shall be no fracturing, packing, or cracking of council districts, if practicable. (15) The one person, one vote principle shall be used. (16) If the commission establishes criteria in addition to those enumerated in the Charter and this chapter, the commission shall use impartial criteria that meet standard of fairness principles. (17) If practicable, socio-economic criteria used in developing the plan, not specifically set forth in this chapter, shall be identified, documented, and approved by majority vote of the commission, before drawing proposed council district boundaries. If practicable, socio-economic groups shall be kept together. (2011, ord 11-29, sec 2.)36-4 Article 4. Plan Deviations.