Mt. Lebanon
The South Hills, including South Fayette, Upper St. Clair, Bethel Park, South Park, and Mt Lebanon are an ideal community of interest that have been represented some way together in state legislative maps since the 1966 constitutional convention. They are home to some of the most recent population growth in Allegheny County that has led to the county's first net positive growth census in decades. However, the preliminary senate map proposes to separate Mt. Lebanon from the like minded communities of the south hills, instead moving it i to a Pittsburgh based district, which is much more urban an is located northward to the other communities of the south hills. While the current district 42 does need to gain more population, there is no reason to remove Mt. Lebanon from district 37. To increase district 42, it could simply take in other communities from the Ohio river valley that reside closer to the North Shore of Pittsburgh and those bordering McKees Rocks and Stowe Township. While Mt Lebanon does border the city of Pittsburgh, historically and politically it has much more in common with the communities of the south hills and district 37 than it does with the city of Pittsburgh and communities along the Ohio River. Putting Mt Lebanon in district 37 would make the senate map more compacter, fairer, and more depictive of historical, political, and social coalitions.