Gerrymandering in County Commissions

• In Event: Issues in Redistricting Reform (Virtual)

Abstract

County governments have traditionally been assumed to operate in a largely nonpartisan manner, even though the majority of counties choose their commissions via partisan elections. However, recent scholarship on the largest counties in the US has demonstrated that partisan composition does influence policy outcomes. This raises the question of whether partisanship affects counties the same way it affects state legislatures when it comes to redistricting: is there county commission gerrymandering, and where does it take place? In this paper, I apply automated methods developed for state-level questions to a sample of counties to gauge the distribution of district plans based on partisan strength given neutral redistricting, and compare the results to the actual partisan composition of those counties. The common practice in rural areas of dividing the principal town in the county across all members’ districts has a partisan effect, and may reduce the diversity of views held by commissions in those areas.

Author

• Brian Amos, Wichita State University