Longmont’s city clerk is seeking feedback from residents about three options for ward redistricting.
The city’s charter requires the boundaries be updated at least every 10 years, and the last redistricting occurred in 2012.
Using updated data from the 2020 U.S. Census, Longmont City Clerk Dawn Quintana and her team created three proposed maps for public comment.
The ward boundaries determine which groups of residents elect their local officials, so community feedback is essential, Quintana said.
“What we really want to do is not break up communities of interest — so say there’s a community of interest that we have not thought about, that we’ve put in different wards,” she explained. “Are we diluting someone’s vote? Or fortifying unreasonably? Is there some layout we haven’t looked at from local politics?”
Three council members are elected by voters from each of Longmont’s three wards, so the final redistricting map will determine how those representatives are elected. There are three at-large council members and the mayor, who serve the whole city, and their election will not be impacted by the redistricting.
“Our charter says we have to balance our wards by qualified voters; best practice and statute says you should balance it by population — because when you balance by population, that’s more fair,” Quintana explained.
Her team has used a combination of both qualified voters and population to create its three options, which is why each map shows both numbers.
“They are quite different,” Quintana noted.
The maps show which precincts would be moved out of their current respective ward into a new one, while retaining “reasonably balanced population numbers,” the city clerk said. Precincts can’t be cut.
“You’re never going to balance it exactly mathematically,” she explained. “Best practice in the ward redistricting municipal levels is — you want to be within a 5% acceptable deviation.”
The city updated its redistricting webpage Tuesday in an effort to help residents understand the maps and process. Community members can take a poll to choose their top option, or join a discussion in the redistricting feedback forum.
Public comment will be accepted through Jan. 31, but another round of feedback may occur if there is no clear winning map, Quintana said.
