New redistricting plans throw 9th

Whitman County could have a new U.S. Representative and have a new legislative district under some of the proposals released Tuesday by the state Redistricting Commission.

The commission, comprised of two Democrats and two Republicans, released four separate maps for updated legislative and congressional districts as required every 10 years in response to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Democrats’ plans would move the state’s 9th Legislative District to the Tri-Cities and place Whitman County in the 16th district with Asotin Garfield, Columbia and Walla Walla counties.

The plan by Tim Ceis, appointed to the commission by Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown of Spokane, would slice Adams County into the 13th District, meaning 9th District Sen. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville, would be moved out of his district.

“The Democrats drew up a strictly partisan plan. They gave themselves a great negotiating chip in trying to get rid of either Schoesler or Hewitt,” said Schoesler.

The plan put forth by Dean Foster, a house Democrat, would also put most of the existing 9th District into the 16th, but would leave Adams County connected.

Foster’s plan would force a new 16th to decide between Schoesler or Hewitt, both high-ranking Republicans, for the Senate seat.

“What it would do is deprive eastern Washington of either 12 or 20 years of experience in the Senate and one of the three top Republicans in the Senate,” said Schoesler.

Republican Commissioner Slade Gorton, a former U.S. Senator, moves the 9th District out of Spokane County and expands it southerly to include parts of Pasco. Gorton’s plan would take Eastern Washington University out of the 9th District.

Ceis and Foster would also take EWU out of the 9th District.

The commission was also charged with redrawing congressional boundaries as an increase in the state’s population gave an additional seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.

As part of his plan to add a 10th Congressional district, Ceis would move Whitman County out of the district of Republican Cathy McMorris-Rodgers. The county would join the Tri-Cities and Yakima in the 4th Congressional District.

All four plans also create a congressional district in the Seattle I-5 urban area.

Maps of the four proposals, as well as those proposed by the public, are available on the commission’s web site: http://www.redistricting.wa.gov.

The public will have a chance to weigh in on the proposals at an Oct. 11 meeting in Olympia. Law requires redistricting be done by Jan. 1, but a release by the commission said they hope to have a finalized plan by Nov. 1.

The revised boundaries will be in place by the 2012 election when voters select representatives for congress for the first time in the new decade.