In the wake of the Democratic victory over Republicans - a win for fair maps - I hereby propose a map to the Wisconsin Supreme Court.
This corrects for the big bias for Republicans that existed under the maps in the 2010s and in 2022. It creates good districts that have strong communities of interest.
The cohesive nature of each of the districts are as follows.
1st: This seat combines areas alongside Lake Michigan, including all of Kenosha and Racine County, all the way to the Menominee River, in the process serving as a Latino interest seat and unifying Latino areas in cities alongside the shoreline.
2nd: This district has most of Dane County, as well as some northern parts of southeast Wisconsin. It takes on most of Waukesha County in order to reach quota. It retains the same basic core as it did pre-2023 and post-2023.
3rd: This CD takes in a wide range of areas along and close to the Mississippi River, and takes in Rock County to reach the full population. If it instead pushed north, it would encroach on the compact WI-07, and if it went into Central WI, it would have hurt WI-06.
4th: This district takes in basically the rest of the coastline of the Wisconsin (on Lake Michigan, anyhow). The district also has Green Bay, home to the Packers. (Some) Packers fans in Milwaukee now can enjoy the Packers being in their home district.
5th: This congressional district centers on rural and urban areas along linked highways running from downtown Milwaukee and the Illinois state border. It also takes many parts of Milwaukee that cannot go in the 4th. It, along with the 5th, serves as a seat where especially relatively substantial numbers of the Dem primary electorate would be Black.
6th: This seat combines the urban community of interest in Central and eastern Wisconsin. Appleton, Oshkosh, Stevens Point, all are within this seats' borders. Unfortunately, it would have ruined the 8th to have it include Green Bay. Boxed in by the 7th, 6th, and 3rd, it takes in parts of Dane.
7th: This seat is very nice, and is compact and basically perfect. I loved it so much I accepted an imperfect 3rd, 6th, and 8th just to see it exist.
8th: Wisconsin is 30 percent rural. The state needs two rural seats, and WI-03 doesn't count because a big chunk of its population comes from La Crosse, Eau Claire, and Rock Counties. WI-07 is one such rural seat, and this is another. It does have some exurban/suburban communities within it, but that can't be helped. If we have a quasi-dedicated rural seat in Western Wisconsin, there should also be one, or as close as one that can exist, in Eastern Wisconsin. Since this is Eastern Wisconsin, having it not completely rural is fine...population densities are higher in this part of the state.
I look forward to this map being adopted by the WI supreme court who will overturn the currently unfair Republican maps, and the court masters they will appoint to draw new maps to take their place.
