Every ten years after the new Census numbers come out each state goes through the throes of redrawing their legislative and congressional districts. As usual, there has been much drama around this act as wrangling ensues when political parties in power work to ensure that the boundaries favor their influence to keep their candidate in power. The political influence of district boundary configuration is known as gerrymandering, and in Utah a new level of transparency is promised in order to combat this tendency with an online mapping tool allowing citizen-created maps as input.
With new levels of map literacy and online mapping tools, the 2011 redistricting should be the most transparent of any before. Allowing citizen input into redistricting plans doesn’t ensure that gerrymandering won’t occur, because the final decision on boundaries is up to the full legislature and Governor approval, but it does offer a new level of bipartisan input into the process. Utah also has the help of a bipartisan citizen action group called Represent Me Utah that aims to put a stop to gerrymandering in the state.
UPDATE: The new mapping software is now available and can be accessed from the state’s redistricting site: www.RedistrictUtah.com.
