Pierce County’s population is changing. Its political boundaries? Probably not so much.
Elected officials and political consultants told The News Tribune that while there has been a population surge across the second-largest county in the state, not much is expected to change as the state goes about redrawing political boundaries, a process know as redistricting.
“We will always be a swing county with a diverse, large city and big, more rural areas,” Republican political consultant Alex Hays said.
In the newest data collected by the U.S. Census Bureau last year, Pierce County’s population grew from 795,628 residents in 2010 to 921,130 in 2020, a 15.7 percent increase.
Pierce County wasn’t the only region with a population boom. While the U.S. Census reported that the nation grew at its slowest rate over the last decade since the 1930s, Washington’s overall population grew at a rate of 14.6 percent.
Redistricting occurs once every decade after the U.S. Census counts the country’s population. Political boundaries have to be redrawn to ensure all districts have as close to the same number of people as possible.
This time around, with most Washington counties seeing more residents, the increase in population largely cancels out in redistricting.
Pierce County Council Chairman Derek Young (D-Gig Harbor) and state Representative J.T. Wilcox (R-Yelm) said they feel Washington’s redistricting processes are bipartisan.
“Gerrymandering is one of the things that people lose trust in the government,” Young said. “Politics shouldn’t pick voters — voters should pick politicians.”
In other states like Texas and Maryland, large majorities of one party give Republicans and Democrats respectively full control of the redistricting process, which is done in the state legislature, not by a bipartisan commission like in Washington.
Federal and state districts
To determine new borders for state and congressional districts, state House and Senate leaders of Democratic and Republican parties chose four voting members — two Democrats and two Republicans.
The four voting members, known as state redistricting commissioners, then select a fifth, nonvoting chairperson to lead the Washington State Redistricting Commission. By Nov. 15, the commission must draw new district lines in compliance with state law. Districts must be made as equal in population as possible and avoid splitting up cities and political subdivisions. The state Legislature can make minor changes to the maps, but the governor has no role.
State redistricting commissioners released their four proposed congressional maps on Sept. 28.
The biggest change could be Tacoma’s representation. Tacoma is divided between congressional districts now. The city largely falls in U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer’s District 6, but the southeast corner of the city sits in U.S. Rep. Marilyn Strickland’s District 10. The Port of Tacoma is in U.S. Rep. Adam Smith’s District 9.
Most of the maps are similar in keeping District 6 in the north, District 10 sprawling across Tacoma into Lakewood, and District 8 in East Pierce County, but two keep Tacoma in District 6 and two place Tacoma in District 10.
The last redistricting gave Pierce County three congressional districts, Districts 6, 8, and 10. The four proposed congressional maps give Pierce either three or four districts. Two maps give a fourth seat of District 3, swinging up from Thurston County into Roy and Eatonville.
Republican minority leader Wilcox, Progressive Strategies NW’s Ben Anderstone and Young don’t think that much will change.
Wilcox helped select one of the redistricting commissioners. He said districts will largely keep their incumbents and won’t move very much.
“The differences are more subtle,” he told The News Tribune.
On the state level, many were surprised Seattle didn’t grow as exponentially as expected.
The political consultants said there won’t be as big of a pull to move more seats into King County. At present, King County accounts for 17 state district seats. Proposed maps either keep that amount or add one more. Seattle’s population increased by 18 percent over the last decade.
“We had talked about a domino effect of Seattle, but there was less of a domino effect than we estimated,” Anderstone said.
Pierce County presently has eight legislative seats. According to four proposed maps by the committee, one divides Pierce County into seven districts, two divide the county eight ways, and another divides Pierce into nine seats.
The county could share three to five state seats with Kitsap, King, Thurston and Yakima counties. Currently, Pierce shares a seat with each King, Kitsap and Thurston.
Both parties want Pierce to have fewer seats split with other counties.
“It may be that we see less splitting, and that is the goal to keep municipalities intact,” Anderstone said. “I believe the population growth both in the state and Pierce County will mean a little less splitting for seats.”
Pierce County districts
For the seven Pierce County Council seats, the process is slightly different. The council selects four commissioners — two from each party — from a list provided by each party. The four commissioners choose a fifth member to serve as chair of the committee.
The council appointed the four members on Sept. 7. The committee has until Nov. 4 to appoint a districting master, who is responsible for drawing the redistricting map. Once selected, the master has 60 days to draw a plan to be submitted to the committee for approval. It takes four of five members to amend anything in the plan.
“It isn’t just bipartisan, it insists on bipartisanship. If they can’t agree on making a change, no change can be made,” Young said.
The Pierce County Auditor’s Office is limited to the adjustment of precincts after the redistricting is completed, Auditor Julie Anderson said.
Young said the deadline is unexpectedly tighter this year, because the coronavirus pandemic pushed back data collection for the U.S. Census Bureau, delaying the release date of the data.
“We were scrambling,” he said.
The map is in progress, but not much is expected to change, according to Young and political consultants.
“My guess is districts are large enough. Yes, there have been growth patterns, but it shouldn’t make wild changes. Maybe a few 1,000 people in each district, and that can swing elections, but not an enormous difference,” Young said.
This story was originally published October 24, 2021 5:00 AM.
