Redistricting
• Displaces almost one-third of Bucks County residents, moving over 211,000 people into new legislative districts. • Reduces the number of competitive districts from seven to two. • Takes the voices of almost 80% of Bucks County voters away by making primary elections the deciding factor in your representation in Harrisburg. • Receives an “F” from the Princeton Gerrymandering Project in competitiveness, which notes “it is uncompetitive relative to other maps that could have been drawn.” As the Bucks County Courier Times editorialized: “The commission that's drafted the Pennsylvania House of Representatives' new legislative districts has done Bucks County voters a grave disservice. Additionally, the population displacement will disrupt the work being done by your current state representatives for constituents, it moves local government and community groups away from the representatives they’ve known and worked with and drops a candidate unknown to the people to be their next representative. This will only breed negative consequences. That’s why many local governments have passed resolutions opposing the LRC map. Constitutionally, when redrawn, the legislative maps are to be compact and contiguous, with as nearly equal population as practicable, while discouraging counties, municipalities and townships from being split unless absolutely necessary. Based upon the 2020 Census Bucks County has slightly more than 646,000 residents. Based on the 2020 Census state population the target population per legislative district is a little over 64,000 per district. As currently drawn nine of the 10 districts fall within the constitutionally accepted deviation from 64,000 except for one district, which is slightly more than 67,000. Bucks squarely falls within the necessary population growth to remain constitutional with minimal population shifting. More than 200,000 residents do not need to be displaced while also making all but two legislative districts uncompetitive and leaving 80% of the voting population at the mercy of the political party bosses’ hand-picked candidates. And the last thing we need is more political polarization. I’m tired of today’s politicians doing everything they can to destroy our country, our state and our counties. Leave well enough alone.