While apportionment sub-committee members have their hands more or less tied until the structure of the multi-person commission is agreed upon, the group decided to create a few hypothetical commission district maps that reflect multi-person structures they feel are most reasonable for Pickens county.
The apportionment sub-committee is responsible for creating boundaries of commission districts (based on population and area characteristics) being sure to proportionately represent all citizens of the county. Their drawn districts must pass muster with the Georgia Office of Reapportionment when prospective districts are finalized.
“I would rather be prepared with something,” member Steve Greenwell said.
All subcommittees of the Citizen Advisory Committee will reconvene into that larger body June 1 to present their findings to the entire group, but the apportionment sub-committee has no other meeting scheduled until June 15.
“We at least need to have something to work from, and we will be saving ourselves work down the road,” Greenwell said.
At their first meeting Monday evening, sub-committee members expressed concern with the lack of current census information available, the most recent figures being from the 2000 Census.
“This just isn’t an accurate census now,” said committee member Paul Lindsey who provided other members with what he felt was the best alternative, an up-to-date map of voter precincts in Pickens County identifying the number of registered voters in each district. Roughly half of Pickens residents are registered to vote.
Lindsey, also a member of the Elections and Registration Board, said the precinct map would provide the committee with the most accurate information, given the resources available to them, considering the Citizen Advisory Committee has no operating budget.
Committee members agreed the most logical approach to creating hypothetical commission districts would be various groupings of existing voter precincts to ensure all residents of the county are accurately represented.
The group agreed to create separate district maps for commission boards of both three and five commission members to be voted on by district. They will also draw a third prospective district map for a five-person commission––that with four commissioners elected by district and one elected at-large.
The group was especially wary of a three-person commission structure, one they said would make equal division of the county population very difficult.
“I mean, if they tell us there are going to be three [commissioners], where are we going to cut the pie,” Lindsey asked.
There was also much concern about the uneven distribution of Pickens County’s population with the majority of residents living in the east end of the county.
The committee said they will take special precautions to ensure the county’s west end, with far fewer residents, is accurately represented in the district reapportionments as they are set up.
The group said if precautions were not made, two or three districts on Pickens’ east side could control the outcome of county elections.
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