US House Redistricting: Ohio

[muon2]

Or at least, looking likely.

Sources tell me it passed this evening.

[muon2]

Here's the interactive version.

Districts 1, 3, 9, and 10 had their BVAPs increased compared to the first map passed. OH-10 moves just barely to lean R from solid R. That makes 9 solid R, 3 lean R (6, 10, 14), and 4 solid D. County splits are reduced and OH-15 becomes a reasonable shape.

[muon2]

16 is solid R?

It's 56.6-43.4% on the 2008+2010 metric used in the competition.

However, I will note that my link above is to the Nov version of the plan. From the map BSB posted there appears to be only minimal changes. I'll put up a link to the passed version when it is available.

Edit: According to the Columbus Dispatch, the map at my link is identical to the passed version except for about 800 people shifted in Franklin county. The shift was to accommodate Ted Celeste and put his home in the new Dem OH-03.

[muon2]

16 is solid R?

It's 56.6-43.4% on the 2008+2010 metric used in the competition.

However, I will note that my link above is to the Nov version of the plan. From the map BSB posted there appears to be only minimal changes. I'll put up a link to the passed version when it is available.

Edit: According to the Columbus Dispatch, the map at my link is identical to the passed version except for about 800 people shifted in Franklin county. The shift was to accommodate Ted Celeste and put his home in the new Dem OH-03.

Here's the interactive version as passed. If you click on "SET MAP LAYERS" and then choose "HB 369 as introduced 11-3-11" from the "choose a legislative district ..." button (it's near the end of the list) you can see the changes for Celeste.

[muon2]

Neither 10 nor 14 is remotely competitive as long as the current incumbent is scandalfree and not going anywhere.

That's why they were drawn that way. The Dems wanted more competitive districts, but the GOP wasn't going to budge on that. They would agree to changes that made blacks more competitive in the primaries, but even then they wouldn't go so far as to reduce the GOP numbers very much.

[muon2]

Neither 10 nor 14 is remotely competitive as long as the current incumbent is scandalfree and not going anywhere.

That's why they were drawn that way. The Dems wanted more competitive districts, but the GOP wasn't going to budge on that. They would agree to changes that made blacks more competitive in the primaries, but even then they wouldn't go so far as to reduce the GOP numbers very much.

It appears that the map was extremely skillfully drawn, for a host or reasons, including having Stivers (OH-15) take Athens, since he presumably runs reasonably well among the academic community.  However, the Columbus CD (OH-03) is short 6,000 folks, and this time, the CD's surrounding it, have spot on numbers, so this is going to be a really puzzler. Mapping Columbus is a real horror show of course, given how screwed up the precincts are.  It is kind of interesting that OH-04's primary task was taking out heavily Dem Elyria and Oberlin. Who would have thunk it?  Kaptur only has 45% of the population of her old CD, with 55% mostly Kucinich country (I think, I haven't drawn the Cleveland area yet), also clever. That Dem primary should be a barn burner. I suspect the Pubs enjoy keep Kuch around.

The one possible real trouble spot is that Gibbs in OH-07 (who hangs out in a rural portion of hyper GOP Holmes County), which takes both Canton and Massilon. I suspect he won't run well there relatively speaking, and a Canton based Dem who is reasonably moderate might give him trouble. The Pubs should have a Canton based candidate themselves really. Such is life.

I assume OH-16 is reasonably safe, but I have not drawn it yet.

Did you check out the link I posted? It has the correct map and both demographic and political numbers for each district.

[muon2]

Neither 10 nor 14 is remotely competitive as long as the current incumbent is scandalfree and not going anywhere.

That's why they were drawn that way. The Dems wanted more competitive districts, but the GOP wasn't going to budge on that. They would agree to changes that made blacks more competitive in the primaries, but even then they wouldn't go so far as to reduce the GOP numbers very much.

It appears that the map was extremely skillfully drawn, for a host or reasons, including having Stivers (OH-15) take Athens, since he presumably runs reasonably well among the academic community.  However, the Columbus CD (OH-03) is short 6,000 folks, and this time, the CD's surrounding it, have spot on numbers, so this is going to be a really puzzler. Mapping Columbus is a real horror show of course, given how screwed up the precincts are.  It is kind of interesting that OH-04's primary task was taking out heavily Dem Elyria and Oberlin. Who would have thunk it?  Kaptur only has 45% of the population of her old CD, with 55% mostly Kucinich country (I think, I haven't drawn the Cleveland area yet), also clever. That Dem primary should be a barn burner. I suspect the Pubs enjoy keep Kuch around.

The one possible real trouble spot is that Gibbs in OH-07 (who hangs out in a rural portion of hyper GOP Holmes County), which takes both Canton and Massilon. I suspect he won't run well there relatively speaking, and a Canton based Dem who is reasonably moderate might give him trouble. The Pubs should have a Canton based candidate themselves really. Such is life.

I assume OH-16 is reasonably safe, but I have not drawn it yet.

Did you check out the link I posted? It has the correct map and both demographic and political numbers for each district.

Is that the total score feature for the political numbers?  If so, that utility is currently hanging for me. Maybe I have too much open, and my computer is overloaded.

Though it was used in VA, the total score was never implemented for OH. The demographics tab has the relevant numbers. The political score is the two party vote average of 2008 Pres and 2010 Gov, Auditor and Sec of State.

[muon2]

OH-13 is around D+9 on this map, but concentrated in the Mahoning Valley, which has been swinging in the Republican direction considerably over the decade. This version may be too gerrymandered for it to happen, but I have to wonder, could this be a competitive district by the end of the decade?

It's unlikely. Youngstown is only 16% R and Warren-Niles are 27% R. That's better than a 3 to 1 advantage for Dems there. Even with the more moderate parts of Akron on the west side of the district, without a scandal I think it will be safe for the decade.

[muon2]

OH-13 is around D+9 on this map, but concentrated in the Mahoning Valley, which has been swinging in the Republican direction considerably over the decade. This version may be too gerrymandered for it to happen, but I have to wonder, could this be a competitive district by the end of the decade?

The index is based on the 2008 presidential race, and the 2010 governor, auditor, and SOS race.  Because of including 3 races from 2010, it has about a 1:2 2010 (Republican) bias.  It's less than 1:3 because of the higher 2008 turnout.  In addiition, the 2010 SOS race was not close at all.  The AG race would have been a better race to use.

The claim was made that the governor, auditor, and SOS were chosen because they comprise the redistricting board for legislative redistricting.  But that doesn't mean their election is representative.

It would be interesting to map the SOS race vs. the governor race.  I googled a little bit and the Democratic candidate for SOS was portrayed as anti-2nd amendment, because she was particularly zealous when she was a Columbus city councilor in asserting a home rule right to restrict carrying of firearms, such that someone from Toledo could be arrested if they traveled to Columbus.  If this was the difference (and there was about a 10% differential from the governor's race), then it might show up more in places like Youngstown than elsewhere.  Perhaps OH-6, which while rural is not particularly Republican.

I was using only the 2008 presidential numbers for that D+9, so it only includes whatever bias that might have. (I have the new OH-13 at 62.3-35.7% Obama). I didn't consider 2010 numbers (and I'm not sure there's anything remarkable of note). The reason why I ask this is because every county in that district has trended toward the Republicans from 2000 to 2008. I'm considering trying to look at the trend for Congressional numbers over the decade, but I don't think that will help much because of Jim Traficant's numbers vs. Tim Ryan's, and Traficant's independent bid in 2010 against Ryan. It's hard to tell too much.

Also, Youngstown itself is probably not going to change a lot, rather the areas around it. Youngstown will contribute to the GOP trend only by shrinking (it's down to like 63,000 now). You might see some larger shifts in Warren and Niles (those cities have fewer minorities and more working class whites). All in all, this might have been prevented by the gerrymander; OH-13 goes through too many urban cores and takes in too few of the areas between to be competitive. Yet, I still think under the right circumstances in 10 years we may be seeing some sign of competitiveness.

Including the three races from 2010 puts OH-13 at 62.3% D to 37.7% R. It's not very different from the Obama numbers, so I would not conclude that the inclusion of the 2010 races biases the index much.

[muon2]

Neither 10 nor 14 is remotely competitive as long as the current incumbent is scandalfree and not going anywhere.

That's why they were drawn that way. The Dems wanted more competitive districts, but the GOP wasn't going to budge on that. They would agree to changes that made blacks more competitive in the primaries, but even then they wouldn't go so far as to reduce the GOP numbers very much.

It appears that the map was extremely skillfully drawn, for a host or reasons, including having Stivers (OH-15) take Athens, since he presumably runs reasonably well among the academic community.  However, the Columbus CD (OH-03) is short 6,000 folks, and this time, the CD's surrounding it, have spot on numbers, so this is going to be a really puzzler. Mapping Columbus is a real horror show of course, given how screwed up the precincts are.  It is kind of interesting that OH-04's primary task was taking out heavily Dem Elyria and Oberlin. Who would have thunk it?  Kaptur only has 45% of the population of her old CD, with 55% mostly Kucinich country (I think, I haven't drawn the Cleveland area yet), also clever. That Dem primary should be a barn burner. I suspect the Pubs enjoy keep Kuch around.

The one possible real trouble spot is that Gibbs in OH-07 (who hangs out in a rural portion of hyper GOP Holmes County), which takes both Canton and Massilon. I suspect he won't run well there relatively speaking, and a Canton based Dem who is reasonably moderate might give him trouble. The Pubs should have a Canton based candidate themselves really. Such is life.

I assume OH-16 is reasonably safe, but I have not drawn it yet.

OH-04 had the original task of taking up parts of Toledo in the September map. Putting most of the black areas in Toledo back into Kaptur's district was a result of negotiations between the GOP and black legislators. Neither side got all they wanted, since Toledo is still split, just not as much. To compensate for the extra population that needed to go into 09, OH-04 had to take on a different Dem area. Elyria is not part of Kaptur's current district, nor is it part of Kucinich's, so it was sent to 04 in exchange for the aforementioned Toledo areas.

[muon2]

Yes, that was my guess, without having really studied the original mess the GOP came up with. The Pubs just did an exchange with OH-09, where instead of OH-04 taking some of Toledo, it took Oberlin and Elryia instead, accomplishing the mission just as well, if not better, since that avoids a Toledo tri-chop.  As I said, the Pubs here were very clever, considerably more so than the PA clowns. I quite admire their handiwork. In I think each and every instance, I said to myself, hey that makes sense.

This is an advantage to having the Speaker in your delegation. I saw the same power at work 10 years ago in IL as the bipartisan gerrymander was fashioned.

[muon2]

Neither 10 nor 14 is remotely competitive as long as the current incumbent is scandalfree and not going anywhere.

That's why they were drawn that way. The Dems wanted more competitive districts, but the GOP wasn't going to budge on that. They would agree to changes that made blacks more competitive in the primaries, but even then they wouldn't go so far as to reduce the GOP numbers very much.

It appears that the map was extremely skillfully drawn, for a host or reasons, including having Stivers (OH-15) take Athens, since he presumably runs reasonably well among the academic community.  However, the Columbus CD (OH-03) is short 6,000 folks, and this time, the CD's surrounding it, have spot on numbers, so this is going to be a really puzzler. Mapping Columbus is a real horror show of course, given how screwed up the precincts are.  It is kind of interesting that OH-04's primary task was taking out heavily Dem Elyria and Oberlin. Who would have thunk it?  Kaptur only has 45% of the population of her old CD, with 55% mostly Kucinich country (I think, I haven't drawn the Cleveland area yet), also clever. That Dem primary should be a barn burner. I suspect the Pubs enjoy keep Kuch around.

The one possible real trouble spot is that Gibbs in OH-07 (who hangs out in a rural portion of hyper GOP Holmes County), which takes both Canton and Massilon. I suspect he won't run well there relatively speaking, and a Canton based Dem who is reasonably moderate might give him trouble. The Pubs should have a Canton based candidate themselves really. Such is life.

I assume OH-16 is reasonably safe, but I have not drawn it yet.

OH-04 had the original task of taking up parts of Toledo in the September map. Putting most of the black areas in Toledo back into Kaptur's district was a result of negotiations between the GOP and black legislators. Neither side got all they wanted, since Toledo is still split, just not as much. To compensate for the extra population that needed to go into 09, OH-04 had to take on a different Dem area. Elyria is not part of Kaptur's current district, nor is it part of Kucinich's, so it was sent to 04 in exchange for the aforementioned Toledo areas.

Yes, that was my guess, without having really studied the original mess the GOP came up with. The Pubs just did an exchange with OH-09, where instead of OH-04 taking some of Toledo, it took Oberlin and Elryia instead, accomplishing the mission just as well, if not better, since that avoids a Toledo tri-chop.  As I said, the Pubs here were very clever, considerably more so than the PA clowns. I quite admire their handiwork. In I think each and every instance, I said to myself, hey that makes sense.

Why not just do it in the first place?

One factor the OH GOP did not consider was the threat of a referendum. That emerged after the legislation for the map was presented. The OH Senate thought they had a way to bypass the threat by attaching an appropriation to the map bill, but that was struck down by the 6-1 GOP OH Supremes. The only other way to stop a referendum was to get enough Dem votes for the map to have it pass by a supermajority. That led to discussions between the GOP and members of the OH Black Caucus.

[muon2]

What if you don't remove Parma, but instead take more blueish towns near Akron?  (Or you could remove Parma Heights instead.  I recall that that's bluer than southern Parma.)  

Nah, Parma Heights is a tad more Pub. Sure you could go to Akron, but the pickings around there outside the zone that is already "Dem sunk" of highly Dem precincts are even thinner on the ground. Close to non existent actually. No, the big move would be for OH-13 to go to Canton, and this small change isn't going to get it there. You need to do a map like the one I first drew to do that ... nice thin long tails to the magic kingdoms of real Dem nodes. .

Here is the city of Parma Heights action for you. As you can see, this beer is so watered down, it hardly even gives you a buzz as it were.



The real change for those 40 Pub basis points, is that it would hurt Kuch, and bad, in his primary against Kaptur. That may have been a little thought in the back of the Pub drawers' minds, but I think they really didn't want to have to defend any more splits than they absolutely needed to do. Pick your shots baby.

Oh, one other  thought. The GOP ceding of Columbus, meant that there were plenty of available Pubs to do a deep Toledo chop, a most effective way of sending the excess Pubs east. Thus the GOP could be rather serene about the Cleveland and NE part of Ohio in general. All the Dem nodes that needed to be neutralized (other than Canton) could, without micro splits. And OH-07, rather than having its hyper Pub areas employed for an attack on Columbus, instead could be used to reasonably contain Canton.  So ceding Columbus made it much easier to draw the map. The Pubs just went nutter over OH-10 for some reason, without really needing to. And the tri-chop of Toledo was just dumb - totally unnecessary. The "genius" who came up with that should be fired.

The folks who ran the OH competition did some FOIA requests. The report provides some interesting background on the mapping decisions.

[muon2]

Maybe it would be better to cut into Greene County? Yellow Springs is pretty heavily Democratic.

Ah, the spirit of now closed Antioch College lives on!  Yes, that is another option, that probably adds another 20 basis points maybe (it is just a couple of hyper Dem precincts excised), but that would not be part of OH-08's existing territory, and it would be odd to chop into the tail of OH-08 jutting east. Actually, on second look,  it might be 40 basis points. The NW corner of Greene is a Dem nest. Interesting. Maybe that was not done, to avoid just not screwing Austria, but making him feel such pain that he just unleashes a primal scream - and lashes out. In lieu of that, Austria gets his whole county, and Turner gets his own county, so fair fight, right - not.

Wherever the cut, I think if anyone thought of this option (OH-10 taking all of Clinton County), it was dumped because per the article just put up, the issue of Stivers' PVI was already a topic of controversy, so finding ways to cut it further to hand something to Turner and OH-10 was just not on the table. Just a guess.

As an aside, I think Antioch reopened this year.

[muon2]

The amendment combines an independent commission structure with the goals used by the redistricting competition. Here's the pdf of the amendment.

[muon2]

The amendment combines an independent commission structure with the goals used by the redistricting competition. Here's the pdf of the amendment.

Yeah, I noticed that as well. Hell, they should just use your map.

If it passes it will be interesting to see how the commission judges the criteria. They could use the same weighting, or give them different weights, including subjective weights.

[muon2]

45% invalid? Something stinks here. Possibly both ends.

Probably not. In large, statewide signature-gathering efforts, with untrained gatherers, there is often a very large number of invalid signatures. Duplicate signatures are common, since many people won't recall if they signed a particular petition, so they will sign again. Add in unregistered residents and non-residents, and conventional wisdom is that at least double the minimum should be turned in. Many recommend triple the minimum.

[muon2]

Of course if the referendum passes and the weighting factors match the 2011 competition I would be partial to the map on the right. It is the one filed by the Dems last fall and has 4 strong R, 3 lean R, 1 even, 7 lean D, and 1 strong R. The leans are all within 10% differential between the parties and most are within 5% (52.5% to 47.5%)

[muon2]

...and of course, it was drawn by a politician.

Of course.

[muon2]

Metro areas are not part of the OH referendum. IMO they are only slightly removed from the squishy subject of communities of interest. The referendum amendment would consider county and municipal lines. It also will consider competitiveness and representational fairness and how that is weighted can drive the choices in a map. They were given equal weight with geography in the competition and that resulted in all the specific choices that TJ notes.

[muon2]

So, I didn't enter the contest from long ago, but had I done so, I would've gone with the following map.



The first thing this map does is identify a number of whole-county groupings, each centered around a metro area and nearby rural counties, which are close enough to a multiple of the idea CD population.  I have five such regions here:  Cincinnati/Dayton (1, 2, 3, ; Toledo (4, 9); Columbus (7, 12, 15); NE Ohio (5, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16); and Zanesville/Ohio River (6).  District 6 has the largest deviation, at 1,198, but it is also entirely whole counties; every other district is within 850 of the ideal, and could be brought to exact equality with microchops.

The second thing this map does is rigorously adhere to municipal boundaries.  Only three cities are split: Cleveland and Akron are split to allow a 50% BVAP VRA district; and Columbus is split because municipal boundaries in Franklin County are beyond insane and I give up.  Except for Hamilton and Cuyahoga, no county has more than 2 CDs; those two have three.

Obviously, with the high-level groupings as well as the within-group splits, I've attempted to keep metro areas as close together as possible.  There are a couple portions which are not entirely satisfactory: putting Madison in with the southeast group rather than Columbus is the worst offender, but as far as I can tell the 4-CD math made it hard to avoid.


Final tally:
4 Safe R (2, 4, 8, 12)
3 Lean R (6, 7, 14)
2 Tossup (3, 5)
3 Lean D (1, 10, 13)
4 Safe D (9, 11, 15, 16)

Seems perfectly balanced to me.

Nice work. The regional approach is along the lines of what I worked on in CA, and what led me to the data set collected in my IA-style studies. It's probably too GOP as measured by the contest, and lacks the competitiveness to score lots in that category, but it would quite possibly have been in the top 10. If I can figure out the conversion from DRA to competition partisanship I'll give you a better assessment.

[muon2]

Here's some equivalent conversions for train's map from the competition plan I linked. The competition used two party votes from the 2010 statewide races that affected the composition of the apportionment board. I quote the GOP fraction, then the McCain part of the two-party vote and GOP part from DRA.

CD 1: Comp 47.52% McCain 44.4% DRAR 47.9%
CD 2: Comp 61.88% McCain 61.3% DRAR 54.2%
CD 3: Comp 51.83% McCain 47.9% DRAR 49.4%
CD 4: Comp 67.59% McCain 64.3% DRAR 61.1%
CD 5: Comp 48.49% McCain 44.0% DRAR 42.7%
CD 6: Comp 52.35% McCain 50.9% DRAR 41.1%
CD 7: Comp 48.67% McCain 44.6% DRAR 44.9%
CD 8: Comp 67.26% McCain 64.0% DRAR 63.0%
CD 9: Comp 49.35% McCain 44.7% DRAR 42.3%
CD 10: Comp 53.56% McCain 49.3% DRAR 44.8%
CD 11: Comp 20.22% McCain 16.1% DRAR 16.3%
CD 12: Comp 61.57% McCain 57.1% DRAR 55.7%
CD 13: Comp 46.80% McCain 42.7% DRAR 37.8%
CD 14: Comp 48.82% McCain 46.2% DRAR 42.3%
CD 15: Comp 47.72% McCain 42.9% DRAR 44.4%
CD 16: Comp 46.52% McCain 44.3% DRAR 38.5%

So the competition is about 2-4% more R than the McCain fraction which is slightly more R than the McCain to PVI shift of about 2.4%. The shift is quite dramatic compared to the DRA avg which is based on the 2006 Govs race.

[muon2]

So here's my analysis of the competition quality of train's map. I've used his Obama number with the likely 3rd party vote to get an R fraction then adjusted it using the table above. Note the competition is about 1.5% more R on average than an equivalent PVI.

CD 1: 47.2% Likely D
CD 2: 62.6% Safe R
CD 3: 51.4% Lean R
CD 4: 65.7% Safe R
CD 5: 53.0% Likely R
CD 6: 54.1% Likely R
CD 7: 55.5% Strong R
CD 8: 68.2% Safe R
CD 9: 44.7% Strong D
CD 10: 47.2% Likely D
CD 11: 23.1% Safe D
CD 12: 63.7% Safe R
CD 13: 50.8% Tossup
CD 14: 48.1% Lean D
CD 15: 40.5% Safe D
CD 16: 47.0% Likely D

Competition scores (with high score for each category)
Fairness leans 3.4% more R than the state as a whole: 86.4 points (top score 99.6)
Competitiveness 3 highly competitive, 5 competitive, 2 somewhat competitive: 21 points (top score 33)
County splits 18: 32 points (top score 43)
Compactness: not scored

If I shifted them by 1.5% to get a PVI, then the fairness zooms to 99.2 points and the competitiveness rises to 22 points. The choice of election data really matters in assessing fairness (cf AZ).

[muon2]

Here's the competition analysis for rbh's map:

CD 1: 60.6% Safe R
CD 2: 47.6% Lean D
CD 3: 68.8% Safe R
CD 4: 49.9% Tossup
CD 5: 63.3% Safe R
CD 6: 55.9% Strong R
CD 7: 57.1% Strong R
CD 8: 68.2% Safe R
CD 9: 63.1% Safe R
CD 10: 46.2% Likely D
CD 11: 49.6% Tossup
CD 12: 47.5% Lean D
CD 13: 52.7% Likely R
CD 14: 48.7% Lean D
CD 15: 24.2% Safe D
CD 16: 48.3% Lean D

Competition scores (with high score for each category)
Fairness leans 10% more R than the state as a whole: 60 points (top score 99.6)
Competitiveness 6 highly competitive, 2 competitive, 2 somewhat competitive: 24 points (top score 33)
County splits 26: 24 points (top score 43)
Compactness: not scored

With the 1.5% shift to PVI this goes to 85.6 points for fairness and 21 points for competitiveness.

[muon2]

So here's my analysis of the competition quality of train's map. I've used his Obama number with the likely 3rd party vote to get an R fraction then adjusted it using the table above. Note the competition is about 1.5% more R on average than an equivalent PVI.

CD 1: 47.2% Likely D
CD 2: 62.6% Safe R
CD 3: 51.4% Lean R
CD 4: 65.7% Safe R
CD 5: 53.0% Likely R
CD 6: 54.1% Likely R
CD 7: 55.5% Strong R
CD 8: 68.2% Safe R
CD 9: 44.7% Strong D
CD 10: 47.2% Likely D
CD 11: 23.1% Safe D
CD 12: 63.7% Safe R
CD 13: 50.8% Tossup
CD 14: 48.1% Lean D
CD 15: 40.5% Safe D
CD 16: 47.0% Likely D

Competition scores (with high score for each category)
Fairness leans 3.4% more R than the state as a whole: 86.4 points (top score 99.6)
Competitiveness 3 highly competitive, 5 competitive, 2 somewhat competitive: 21 points (top score 33)
County splits 18: 32 points (top score 43)
Compactness: not scored

If I shifted them by 1.5% to get a PVI, then the fairness zooms to 99.2 points and the competitiveness rises to 22 points. The choice of election data really matters in assessing fairness (cf AZ).

Good to know.  FWIW, I don't think that it's actually good policy to artificially make districts as competitive as possible if other compelling factors lead to a certain number of non-competitive districts*. However, I could easily imagine setting the boundaries between 7 and 15 to make two lean-D districts instead of a safe D and a likely R; and there's always the option of giving up on the VRA in the northeast corner, which leads to all sorts of ripple effects. 

*I do think it's best to have some competitive districts in most states, though.  There are very few multi-district states where a truly fair districting would make all districts noncompetitive- the only examples I can think of are either small and heavily dominated by one party (Hawaii, Idaho), or feature polarized voting in the Deep South (I don't think anyone can seriously argue against a more-or-less guaranteed 3-1 delegation from Mississippi).

If you look at the entire Congress about 1/4 of the districts qualify as lean or likely. Rather than maximize competitive districts one can set a floor at 1/4 with the stipulation that they be evenly divided between the parties. Your plan easily exceeded that.

I would note that the good-government groups in OH are very, very big on competitiveness. In 2005 they had an amendment on the ballot that would have made competitiveness essentially the only criterion.