Congressional District redistricting brings proposed maps and changes for the area

The proposed Congressional District redistricting maps were released on Tuesday, with a number of possible changes.

Each congressional district within the state is being redrawn to contain roughly 770,000 needed for an equitable distribution.

The Washington State Redistricting mapping website showed that the population of Congressional District 6 came over 36,000 short of that goal.

For Southwest Washington and Congressional District 3, they showed census numbers at 78,884 below the needed allocation.

Each Washington Redistricting Commission member made a number of changes to the congressional districts to bring better population equity throughout the state. 

• Commissioner Graves’ proposal would extend CD6 further into Thurston County, encompassing the entirety of Mason County. His proposal made greater adjustments to CD4, which currently includes Skamania and Klickitat counties. Under his revisions, it would pull in Lewis county and move the other counties to CD4.
• Commissioner Walkinshaw’s adjusted map would pull the City of Shelton into CD6, while also removing portions of South Tacoma. In CD3, his plan also removed Klickitat, but added portions of Mount Rainier National Park.
• Commissioner Fain saw the most expansive change for the coastal areas out of the proposals, adding Pacific County to CD6 as well as portions of Lewis County. Their adjustment for CD3 was to shrink it in size, also removing Skamania and Klickitat, but adding in portions of the Yelm/Eatonville area.
• Commissioner Sims change to CD6 appears to only include the addition of the City of Shelton. For CD3, the Commissioner also removed Klickitat, but added the area surrounding Rochester and the southern Yelm region to accommodate.

Under state guidelines, the Redistricting Commission has until November 15 to adopt and submit the revised congressional and legislative district boundaries.

The deadline for county redistricting plans is December 31.

The Commission will hold a virtual public outreach meeting on Zoom on October 5 at 7 p.m.

Those who wish to comment on the state legislative map proposals can sign up to testify at the meeting by visiting the “Public Outreach Meetings” page on the redistricting website and clicking the “Register for Public Comment” button.

You can watch the Commission’s meeting live on TVW or on their YouTube page.

The meeting will be broadcast in English, Spanish, and American Sign Language. If a member of the public requires interpretation in another language, they can request it upon registration.

The public will find several ways to comment in any language on the proposed maps at the Commission’s website on the “How to Participate” page.

Commissioners will see all comments made regardless of the method of comment or language used. All map submissions, comments on proposed maps, and comments sent using the various methods available on our website are subject to public disclosure under the Washington State Public Records Act.