2011 Congressional Districts

The 2010 Census figures are being released today. Many states stay the same but a few will need to redraw the congressional districts. The changes are:

Massachusetts: 9 districts (-1)
New York: 27 districts (-2)
New Jersey: 12 districts (-1)
Pennsylvania: 18 districts (-1)
South Carolina: 7 districts (+1)
Georgia: 14 districts (+1)
Florida: 27 districts (+2)
Ohio: 16 districts (-2)
Michigan: 14 districts (-1)
Illinois: 18 districts (-1)
Missouri: 8 districts (-1)
Louisiana: 6 districts (-1)
Texas: 36 districts (+4)
Iowa: 4 districts (-1)
Arizona: 9 districts (+1)
Nevada: 4 districts (+1)
Utah: 4 districts (+1)
Washington: 10 districts (+1)

Each state has it's own rules and deadlines as to when it redraws the lines, but it would seem that most states will have everything in place by Jan. 1, 2012. Most will probably be before that, but the first maps probably won't be available for nearly a year.

Ohio, specifically, has a commission that will consist of the Governor, Auditor, Secretary of State, and two more selected by the Republican and Democratic Legislative leadership (meaning that they will probably pick a Republican and Democrat from the Legislature). That would mean that the commission will be 4-1 Republican and will have until Oct. 5, 2011 to redraw the districts.

Nothing is certain but many political observers think that OH-10 (Kucinich - D) will be divided among it's neighbors (OH-11, OH-13, and OH-14). Not much else has been said as to who else will be without a district in 2012 but I wouldn't be surprised if an attempt was made to squeeze OH-9, OH-13, and OH-17 into two districts with some bleed off being taken from OH-5 and OH-16.

Incidentally, OH-9, OH-10, OH-11, OH-13, and OH-17 are the 5 districts that stayed Democrat in the 2010 elections. So, I would expect to see some effort made to keep the 12 Republicans entering the House in 2011 and drop the Democrats from 5 to 3. But I don't know if there are any rules that I'm unaware that will hamstring the commission to keep a certain breakdown based on population.