Commission Passes Rhode Island Redistricting Plans

The R.I. Reapportionment Commission approved new maps for the Congressional and state House and Senate districts at a hearing Monday night at the State House. The maps are redrawn every 10 years, following completion of the U.S. Census.

There will be an additional hearing to consider minor “pocket” changes Thursday.

Votes in favor of the state House and Senate district maps were unanimous; the vote on the U.S. Congressional district was closer, 11-6.

“I think it’s a good compromise,” said Commission co-chair Stephen Ucci (D-District 42, Cranston, Johnston). “Again, not everybody’s going to be happy with it. This turned out to be a lot more difficult than I thought it would be.”

In the U.S. Congressional redistricting, the divided vote illustrated that some were still unhappy that Democrat U.S. Rep. David Cicilline’s district would lose some of the Republican-leaning northwest towns. And there remained concerns about the location of the line dividing Providence between the two Congressional districts.

In the East Bay, population declines have resulted in the loss of a house seat.

“By the time you get to Barrington and Bristol County," you end up - particularly in the House - with not enough population to support everybody. We’ve got [district] 67 coming with most of Warren; [district] 66 is Barrington and the lower part of East Providence," said Kimball Brace, owner of Election Data Services, Inc., the firm hired to assist in the redistricting process.

Brace said he’s spent five hours on Monday with the East Bay delegation. Were they satisfied? “They accepted this proposal,” Brace said evenly.

In Woonsocket, Rep. Lisa Badelli-Hunt (D-Dist. 49) spoke again Monday night, urging the commission to keep Woonsocket districts intact rather than have any of them flow into more suburban Cumberland.

She said she hoped the commission would consider a district map she’d worked on earlier in the day. “We drew the lines in such a way that we captured as many minorities in one district as we could, instead of creating very small pockets of minorities spread out within three districts,” she said.

“The city of Cumberland has grown the most in the state and so there’s a lot of extra people up there, which is why we’re leaning a district over in that direction,” Brace responded.

In the East Bay, population declines have resulted in the loss of a house seat. “By the time you get to Barrington and Bristol County,” Brace said, “you end up - particularly in the House - with not enough population to support everybody. We’ve got [district] 67 coming with most of Warren; [district] 66 is Barrington and the lower part of East Providence.”

Brace said he’s spent five hours on Monday with the East Bay delegation. Were they satisfied? “They accepted this proposal,” Brace said evenly.

Rep. Laurence Ehrhardt of North Kingstown spoke at the hearing because he, he said, every time a new map has come out, more and more of his district has ended up with Rep. Doreen Costa (R- Dist. 32, N.K.).

“There’s no rhyme or reason as to why somebody started doing this trade off,” Ehrhardt said, after asking the commission to consider a map worked out with Costa and himself that would keep their two districts largely the same and simply divvy up the extra areas that need to be added to their districts because Rep. Donald Lally’s (D- Dist. 33, Narr., N.K.) district was too big.

Under the plan voted passed Monday, Ehrhardt’s district would no longer include Quidnesset or Davisville.

Co-chair Ucci stressed that the evening’s votes weren’t the last word.

“We are a reporting commission to the General Assembly,” he explained during the hearing. “Our report will then be submitted in January. It will then be up to the House and Senate to take these up as legislation to go through the normal legislative process. The plan would have to pass both sides of the House and Senate and then ultimately be determined by the governor.”

And, because public testimony was still being heard Monday night and maps were still being tweaked, the commission decided to reconvene on Thursday (12/22) at 4 p.m. to give everyone a chance to review the new maps which should be available by Wednesday, Ucci said. Public comment will again be allowed.

Statewide and county maps are available here.