We would like to get your input on Charleston City Council's draft redistricting plan.

UPDATE:  We are reopening this forum to receive public comment on two additional drafts recently posted to the interactive map that shows all redistricting drafts.  The original draft prioritizes constituent consistency.  These new alternatives (1 & 2) prioritize communities of interest and compactness over constituent consistency.  These alternatives are essentially identical - in each scenario the Councilmembers currently representing districts 3 and 6 are drawn into the same district.  The alternatives vary in the district numbering which drives those councilmember's opportunity to run in the 2023 election.  Comments on these alternatives will be accepted until noon (12:00PM) on Monday, September 12, 2022.

If the original draft plan is adopted, 30% of citizens would have a change in representation. This is a fairly minimal impact considering the City has experienced a 25% growth in population.  If alternatives 1 or 2 are adopted,  approximately 39% of citizens would have a change in city council representation.

The City of Charleston legislative body is made up of thirteen (13) members representing twelve districts plus the Mayor.  The City is constitutionally required to rebalance districts every ten years based on new data released by the US Census.  This process is called redistricting.

The data needed to redraw our political boundaries was released by the US Census on September 16, 2021.  The data is provided in a raw format and has to be processed before it can be used in the City's GIS system to begin creating plans.  Over the past six months, city staff have been analyzind the data and creating a variety of plan scenarios for review and evaluation.  Our priorities have included the following:

• One person, one vote (rebalance district populations)
• District Contiguity
• Constituent Consistency (minimize change to a voter's chosen representative)
• Communities of Interest (places that share common interests or issues)
• District Compactness (keeping districts reasonably compact geographically)

Based on the dramatic change in population and demographics experienced by our community over the past ten (10) years, aside from our first two priorities, these are ambitious goals.  For more information on how the City demographics have changed, visit our Redistricting Storymap. It is also our goal to have a transparent process.  Before actively engaging the public, we wanted to understand how our community wanted to be engaged during the process.  The results of that survey are available online.

The timeline and process for adopting new city council districts depends on the volume and amount of actionable feedback received through this Open Town Hall.  Ideally, we hope to gather rich feedback through this platform that can be incorporated into a final draft.  A final draft will go before City Council initially as a Public Hearing and then voted on and adopted at a later City Council meeting.

For background on the process and how this draft was developed, please view our Redistricting Webinar on the City of Charleston YouTube Channel.