Census Estimates for 2005 -> 2010 apportionment

[jimrtex]

What happens when seats are taken away from a state? Is the congressman just booted out? or what?

In most cases, the legislature looks for a victim, sometimes the district of a minority party in a state, other times, the district of a representative who is retiring.  In Ohio, I think it was Trafficant's suit that was eliminated.

Let's say a state has 10 districts with 600,000 people, and must redistrict to 9 districts of 666,000.  So District 1 might add 66,000 from District 2.  District 2, might then have to add 132,000 from District 3 (to make up the 66,000 additional people due to the loss of the seat, plus what it lost from District 1), and so on.

So you choose a victim.  Each of 4 surrounding districts takes up 150,000 of the eliminated district, and then loses 84,000 to other districts further away.  The representative who lost his district, then is faced with running in one of the other districts, where he must face an incumbent who represented 516,000 of the residents, while he only has represented 150,000 of them.  If the redistricters are clever, the 150,000 don't include anyone from the victim's town except his immediate street.

There is a risk of this tipping a district.  If one of the surrounding districts was narrowly Demolican, then adding 150,000 voters from a Repubcratic district could tip it.

So an alternative would be to take two adjacenct Repubcratic districts and include 333,000 residents of each district, including the home areas of the Repubcratic incumbents, who must face off in a primary if they want to continue in office.  The excess area that is trimmed off the two districts can be selected so that the Demolicans are competitive and is less likely to tip the surrounding Demolican districts.

[jimrtex]

West Virginia's eastern tip is growing quite a bit. It's the outer DC suburbs, and is considerably cheaper than the hideously expensive property further in. The MARC commuter rail has a line that runs from Martinsburg, West Virginia, all the way to Union Station in DC.

That explains part of it I guess, but thats only 3 counties, they'd have to be booming like Loudoun County (fastest in the nation ) to reverse the entire state trend. Most of the rest of West Virginia hasn't grown since the 1940's. 

From 2000-5.

Berkeley 39.4%
Jefferson 29.2%
Hampshire 16.4%
Morgan 13.3%

These 3 are in the eastern panhandle, plus 1 beyond.  Even Hardy was up 9.1%.

Putnam 10.3%

Does Charleston have exurbs?  This is the county west of Kanawha.

Downers:

McDowell  -22.6% deep in S WV coal mining country.  1/5th the population in 5 years.

Tucker  -10.1% at the western tip of Maryland.

Most counties with cities lost:

Kanawha (Charleston) -6.3%.
Cabell (Huntington) -5.%
Ohio (Wheeling) -9.6%
Wood (Parkersburg) -2.0%
Harrison (Clarksburg) -0.8%

The exception was

Monongalia (Morganton & WVU): 5.8%.

Overall, the state had a negative rate of natural growth, -0.3%, as those in their 20s head elsewhere before having families.  The high growth areas of the far east had positive natural growth rate, reflecting young families moving into the area (and a relatively low share of older people who have lived there all their life).

[jimrtex]

The ACS survey, Available under the American Fact Finder on the Census Bureau site US Census Bureau has the population for congressional districts.

The American Community Survey is a large sample survey (3 million households per year) which is intended to replace the long form of the census.  2005 was the first year of the full-scale survey, and produces statistically valid estimates for areas with population of 65,000 or more.  Three years of surveys are to be combined for areas with population of 20,000 or more, and 5 years for all areas.

In Texas, congressional districts that have an excess of 50,000 or more persons (based on 32 districts) are:

CD 3 (+98k) Collin County (Plano and other N Dallas Suburbs)
CD 10 (+97k) NW Harris County to Travis County (Houston to Austin)
CD 22 (+95k) Southern Houston suburbs.
CD 26 (+55k) Denton County (NW Dallas and N Ft Worth suburbs)

CD with deficits of 50,000 or more:

CD 19 (-75k) West Texas (Lubbock, Abilene)
CD 13 (-73k) West Texas (Amarillo, Wichita Falls)
CD 30 (-72k) South Dallas
CD 20 (-72k) Central San Antonio
CD 18 (-71K) NE and NW and SC Houston.
CD 11 (-50k) West Texas (Midland-Odessa, San Angelo)

Based on 35 CDs, there would be an additional district in the Dallas area, one in the Houston area, and one in the Austin, San Antonio and the border area, possibly all Republican.

[jimrtex]

The U.S. Census Bureau isn't a very good agency. Not only did they miss nearly 10 million people (!) as you mentioned

Census Bureau estimate for 2000 vs. 2000 census

6.8 million.

The Census Bureau estimates were produced based on the 1990 census, adjusted by births and deaths, and net international migration.

The error could be a result of (1) undercount in 1990, (2) less undercount in 2000, (3) undercount of births, (4) overcount of deaths, or (5) undercount of international migration.

(3) and (4) are unlikely since the largest error was in the 25-34 age group.  Few if any in this age bracket were born during the 1990s, and relatively few died.  The age distribution suggests that (1), (2), and (5) are most at fault, due to underreporting of illegal international immigration -- both in the 1980s and 1990s.

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Well golly gee whiz it must be true.  There are people other than Cubby who thinks it (Al Sharpton?).  And Cubby "had to say it", suggesting that he may find himself ground up by a cement mixer and poured into a foundation but he still speaks out.

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Census Bureau estimates for 1990s
This shows annual declines for Massachusetts in 1991 and 1992; for New York for 1995, 1996, and 1997; and for Rhode Island for 1994, 1996, and 1997.

[jimrtex]

How likely is it for the overall size of the US House to increase from 435?  (Of course, it would have to be an odd number to prevent ties).

Maybe if Puerto Rico became a state, and 6 or so states were faced with losing representation at the next census.

Generally, the population distribution has been stablizing with fewer representatives changing with each census,  And if you add seats so that Oklahoma and Iowa regain a lost seat, you also have to give an extra seat to places that are growing at a faster rate such as Colorado and Arizona.

And if you increased it by perhaps 10%, any restorations would be lost in a decade or two.  The change in population has been slow enough, that representatives have become accustomed to having 500K, 600K, now almost 700K constituents.  Do you get better representation if they only represented 650K, or would you have to double the size of the House of Representatives.  And then do you really get better representation?