U.S. House Redistricting: New Jersey

[Verily]

I suspect despite all of the talk about last hired, first fired, the committee is going to have to do a fair fight district in the middle/north of the state.

Not true at all. Here's my map that eliminates Runyan and keeps all other incumbents safe. The numbers mostly correspond to current incumbents. NJ-04 becomes NJ-03, however, and NJ-13 becomes NJ-04.

NJ-10 is 54% black; NJ-04 is 54% Hispanic.

Runyan lives in NJ-12, but that seat is very safe for Rush Holt, around D+10.

North Jersey:



South Jersey:

[Verily]

FWIW, I gave the rest of Gloucester and Salem County to NJ-1 because they are Democratic enough and then drew NJ-12 closer into Camden by pulling in Haddon Heights, Pennsauken, and Haddonfield.

My goal with that was to shore up LoBiondo by putting the D parts of Cumberland County into NJ-01, which necessitated dropping the more R parts of Gloucester.

Anyway, you could rearrange NJ-07 and NJ-11 to put the Union County R areas in NJ-11 in exchange for most of the Hunterdon/Somerset/Mercer parts of NJ-11. I just figured the Union R areas would prefer to keep their current Rep, but perhaps not as Lance hasn't been around long.

[Verily]

Okay, here's the list of split municipalities. I only listed split counties. 31 total. A few could be fairly painlessly eliminated.

Bergen County
Tenafly

Passaic County
None

Hudson County
North Bergen
Guttenberg
West New York
Weehawken
Jersey City

Essex County
Belleville
Bloomfield
Montclair
West Orange
Newark

Union County
Summit
Union
Roselle Park
Elizabeth
Linden
Rahway
Westfield
Scotch Plains

Middlesex County
Edison
Woodbridge
Carteret

Monmouth County
Middletown
Hazlet

Somerset County
Franklin (aka Somerset)

Hunterdon County
None

Mercer County
Hopewell Twp
Ewing (Both could be eliminated if Holt moved to Princeton.)
Hamilton

Ocean County
Dover (aka Toms River)

Burlington County
None

Camden County
None

Gloucester County
Monroe

Cumberland County
Fairfield

[Verily]

Interesting, it swung to Corzine. I had to put it in my Rush Holt district and was worried that it was a Republican town.

Smith lives there. That's the main reason I put (most of) it in his district.

[Verily]

If you're going to do that map, why not swap out Vineland for Lakehurst in NJ-02?

Or, frankly, just go with my plan that basically did the same NJ-03 but numbered in NJ-12 and extended it just far enough north to take in Holt. That way, Runyan is still eliminated, and there is no unpleasantness with two incumbents tossed out (as the commission surely will not allow).

[Verily]

I have some nitpicks here and there. I think you unintentionally chopped off the NE corner of Ridgewood from NJ-09 and also put the southwestern corner of Belleville in the new NJ-12 for unknown reasons.

Also, I don't understand why you put Tenafly and Englewood Cliffs in NJ-05; Englewood Cliffs is marginally Republican (around 51% McCain), but Tenafly is substantially Democratic (around 63% Obama) and a lot bigger. Better to cut out a marginal town elsewhere, like Ridgewood.

Also not sure why Prospect Park and Haledon are in NJ-05 instead of NJ-08. They are much more Democratic than Woodland Park.

I would also try to fit the Republicans in central Union County into Frelinghuysen's district. You can do this by taking the D-leaning shore towns in Monmouth in NJ-07 (like Tinton Falls, Eatontown and Red Bank) and put them in NJ-06, leaving room for NJ-07 to take in population from NJ-11 after NJ-11 takes in the Republican towns in Union County from NJ-06.

[Verily]

You can get Hoboken into Rothman's district fairly easily, however. I have done so on my map, putting all of Kearny in Sires's district in exchange (all of Kearny is more Hispanic than Hoboken).

Bayonne isn't even very Democratic (only in the low 50s Obama), so it's not worth it. Better for the Democrats for it to be tied up in a Hispanic seat.

Also, at least on Johnny's map, Pascrell's seat still has the bulk of its population in Passaic County and in D fortresses elsewhere like Plainfield and Montclair. So having some swingy-towns in Union and Middlesex is not such a concern (but you should really try to get >60% McCain Clark out of his district if possible, perhaps by going through Westfield, which was only around 55% Obama). Remember, his current seat has some really R towns in Passaic like Wayne, North Haledon and Totowa in it, so Johnny's version is probably more D than the old version.

Anyway, not possible to put Rothman and Sires together--Sires's seat has to stay substantially Hispanic, and there aren't enough Hispanics in Bergen County to push it north. Probably possible to put Rothman and Pascrell together, but there's no way it would happen. The likely R plan would probably put Smith and Pallone together in an R seat. (Pallone lives on the shore in Monmouth, so you have to really reach to get him into a D seat.)

[Verily]

One scenario on a Republican map could be for Sires (who is pretty far north in Hudson) to absorb some real-estate in the Meadowlands and the Palisades communities and go into heavily  minority and Democratic Hackensack (which is very similarly demograhically and economically to much of his current district). Pascrell could take remaining D-leaning Territory in Bergen, with Garrett absorbing Fair Lawn (which is only marginally Democratic AND only voted 5100 to 4100 for hometown son Rothman in 2010,), as well as GOP leaning Saddle Brook. Considering Garrett won this past election 65-35, even a little bit of boost for Rothman in the Bergen parts of a new NJ-5 would not be enough to overcome Garrett's strong base.

Hudson County is not that far short of a whole district all by itself. If you're pushing north into Bergen, it isn't very far, not far enough to even reach the Democratic trifecta in central Bergen (Englewood, Teaneck and Hackensack).

Also, although he lives there, Rothman is not Fair Lawn's hometown son. He's from Englewood and was mayor here back in the 1980s.

[Verily]

My new design, likely very close to the actual result. I had details written up, but the stupid forum lost them. Destroyed Lance's district, shored up everyone else except LoBiondo, who can't be helped. All seats except LoBiondo's should be safe for their party. Lance is in NJ-05 but wouldn't have a prayer in a primary with Garrett, whose entire base is still in the district. Minimal municipal splits; didn't count them up but probably fewer than the 30 in the current map.

The four non-minority Democratic seats in North/Central Jersey are all 51-54% white. Considered forcing one to be minority-majority but decided it wasn't worth it as the incumbent would win regardless. NJ-10 is 51.9% black VAP; NJ-12 (former NJ-13) is 53.4% Hispanic VAP (!).

[Verily]

Mine looks a lot simpler than any weird construct that pits Pascrell against Garrett (what? how is that possible?) or Frelinghuysen, both of which would require shifting a lot more territory. My map is pretty conservative, I think.

[Verily]

Mine looks a lot simpler than any weird construct that pits Pascrell against Garrett (what? how is that possible?) or Frelinghuysen, both of which would require shifting a lot more territory. My map is pretty conservative, I think.

How on earth is that simple? That yellow district looks like a McDonalds arch; pitting Rodney against Garrett simply means combining Morris and the southern body of Passaic County.

Incoherent, perhaps, but not complicated.

Have you looked at Garrett's current district? It similarly arcs around the edge of the state. The changes to his district on my map are tiny, especially compared to what would have to be massive shifts of population to put him or Frelinghuysen with Pascrell. (Interestingly, I did consider and reject putting Morristown and environs in NJ-08, which would have put Frelinghuysen with Pascrell, but then you would have to redraw my map to put Lance in what is now Frelinghuysen's seat. I suppose that could work, but that's really eliminating Frelinghuysen, not pitting him against anyone, since Morristown is fairly Democratic and most of Morris would still be in Frelinghuysen's former seat.)



If only it were so easy as "simply" combining Morris and southern Passaic. What do you do with everything else? There's a ton of Essex County in NJ-08; it doesn't just disappear, but Morris+southern Passaic is already oversized. You'll be forced to loop NJ-05 further down like I did anyway--but then you run into Lance in Hunterdon. It is pure fantasy to think such would be easy. (It would if you were operating on a blank slate, but we are not.)

[Verily]

Nobody believes anything they're saying about not gerrymandering. If they're worried about not shifting around tons of people, they're going to have to at least preserve the existing gerrymander, which is all I did. Anything they say about compactness is blowing smoke; they said the same things in 2000.

[Verily]

There's enough population in the Holt parts of Monmouth to up the populations of the southern districts (and no reason for them to be put anywhere but with Smith). No need to draw Pallone out of his seat.

[Verily]

Partisan data makes for gerrymandering fun!

Here's a Democratic gerrymander creating an 8-3-1 map (maybe could be 9-3 or 8-2-2 with more aggression). Municipal splits were generally avoided, although not minimized. There is a 51% black VAP seat and a 52% Hispanic VAP seat.

NJ-01 (Camden): 61-38 Obama, safe D (Andrews [D])
NJ-02 (Atlantic City): 53-46 Obama, toss-up (LoBiondo [R])
NJ-03 (Trenton): 61-38 Obama, safe D (Runyan [R], Smith [R])
NJ-04 (Toms River): 41-58 McCain, safe R (open)
NJ-05 (Wayne): 43-56 McCain, safe R (Garrett [R])
NJ-06 (Edison): 60-39 Obama, safe D (Pallone [D])
NJ-07 (New Brunswick): 60-39 Obama, safe D (Holt [D])
NJ-08 (Paterson): 64-35 Obama, safe D (Pascrell [D]) -- also narrowly minority-majority
NJ-09 (Hackensack): 61-39 Obama, safe D (Rothman [D])
NJ-10 (Newark): 83-16 Obama, safe D (Payne [D]) - 51% black VAP, 22% white, 18% Hispanic, 5% Asian*
NJ-11 (Bridgewater): 42-57 McCain, safe R (Frelinghuysen [R], Lance [R])
NJ-12 (Jersey City): 69-30 Obama, safe D (Sires [D]) - 52% Hispanic VAP, 30% white, 7% black, 7% Asian**





*That's close to the maximal pack. There could be a couple of white areas in Union County dropped for some of the 20-30% black precincts left in Montclair, West Orange and Bloomfield, but that actually would not even increase it to 52% black VAP. All of Orange, East Orange and South Orange, as well as the black parts of Maplewood and Montclair and some mixed parts of West Orange are already in the seat.

**Pretty much the maximal pack without splitting any more municipalities.

[Verily]

51% McCain is not an "opportunity". It would be an opportunity if it voted for Obama.

There's no compromise on that map, just a Republican map. A compromise map would either be more favorable to Holt (maybe 56-57% Obama) or not make NJ-02 and NJ-03 safer.

[Verily]

That would be a very valid viewpoint if New Jersey was in the business of containing larger counties into 1 congressional district. As it stands, only Morris, Warren, and the 4 southern counties are.

It's not an issue of counties, which are pretty irrelevant in NJ, but having more than one district go from Delaware River to the shore when there is more justification for a north/south split.

Indeed, but such machinations do not give the Republicans an extra district. There are still 2 Democratic leaning districts in South Jersey.

Sure they give an extra Republican seat. A natural map of South Jersey would create two Democratic seats (one in Camden/Gloucester Counties and one in Burlington County), one Republican seat (most of Ocean County) and one marginal seat (Atlantic City, Cape May, outer Gloucester, etc.).

That's a pretty clear communities of interest grouping. The shore gets two districts and the Delaware Valley gets two districts, and each is very cohesive (well, except the Atlantic/Cumberland/Cape May seat, but that area is weird and doesn't fit well with anywhere else, either, so it'll have to do).

[Verily]

Here's my new fair New Jersey map. Intentionally made no attempt to make a majority black or Hispanic district, although Payne and Sires would easily be reelected anyway. (This map would be perfectly VRA-compatible as it does not dilute minority voting power, just fails to gerrymander to concentrate it extremely--although there is still a plurality black district and a [barely] plurality Hispanic district.) No municipal splits (as a result, the districts vary by about 4,000 max from ideal, though some are very close to ideal).

Not totally happy with the four-way split of Somerset County (if you can't tell, North Plainfield is with Union County), but I was trying to go with communities of interest, and I think this split fairly accurately reflects commuting and settlement patterns.

The two Republican seats in NW Jersey were drawn that way to create one more suburban seat and one more rural seat. I felt this better reflected communities of interest than following county lines.

As for partisanship:

NJ-01 (Camden): 64-35 Obama
NJ-02 (Atlantic City): 55-44 Obama
NJ-03 (Toms River): 45-54 McCain
NJ-04 (Middletown): 46-53 McCain
NJ-05 (Wayne): 45-54 McCain
NJ-06 (Elizabeth): 62-37 Obama (45% white, 28% Hispanic, 17% black, 7% Asian VAP - minority opportunity)
NJ-07 (New Brunswick): 59-40 Obama (also 20% Asian VAP, although majority white)
NJ-08 (Paterson): 67-32 Obama (41% white, 32% Hispanic, 12% Asian, 12% black VAP - minority opportunity)
NJ-09 (Jersey City): 69-30 Obama (37% Hispanic, 37% white, 13% Asian, 9% black VAP - plurality Hispanic)
NJ-10 (Newark): 79-20 Obama (41% black, 31% white, 20% Hispanic, 4% Asian VAP - plurality black)
NJ-11 (Morristown): 43-56 McCain
NJ-12 (Trenton): 61-38 Obama

[Verily]

I see the VRA still being the law of the land. A fair map reflects the VRA. I do not understand the obsession with not splitting municipalities.

My map is here:

http://www.redracinghorses.com/diary/1196/new-jersey-redistricting-plan

My map is completely VRA-compliant. All the VRA requires is that minorities not be diluted in their voting power and be enabled to elected their preferred candidates. In some areas, particularly where the majority population has been demonstrated to block-vote against minority candidates (the Deep South), this necessitates a 50%+1 VAP standard for minority districts, although even there a district could be VRA compliant if it were, say, 47% black and very likely to elect the preferred black candidate. Of course, in NJ racial polarization in voting patterns is much weaker, and consequently a 41% black plurality district is completely within the VRA provided it is not intentionally drawn to dilute the black community (and, while splitting counties and municipalities rampantly could up the black percentage, it's pretty clear that this map is not intentionally diluting them).

Also, missed that about Brigantine. Shouldn't be hard to fix.

I would figure Frelinghuysen would be favored over Garrett in that NJ-11; Garrett is a little bit too provocative and doesn't have much institutional support. I think the Passaic/Sussex/Warren and Morris parts of the district are about evenly split, though. Garrett also might try moving to NJ-05 and running there, although he's not at all a good fit for the seat.

Lance is just completely removed, but his district is the most obviously problematic anyway (well, except Pallone, but that's just because of where Pallone lives; the district itself ought to exist, just without the tail to Asbury Park).

Does Pascrell really live in Paterson? I just figured he was totally screwed, might try a run in NJ-05 but would lose. If he's in Paterson, maybe he could beat Rothman in a primary, but I doubt it--the Passaic County parts of NJ-08 are only about a third of the seat.

Also, Smith is cut out of his district (he lives in Hamilton, in Mercer County), but he could easily move to NJ-04.

[Verily]

Here's a 13-district version with 2000 numbers. The "new" district is the marginal Bergen County seat (probably around D+2, although I don't have partisan data; the NJ-08 and NJ-13 parts of Bergen County are both marginal, so NJ-09 is about the same as the county as a whole). NJ-13 on this map is actually more Hispanic since it doesn't extend as far into Bergen County.



Not a huge fan of the split of Bergen County as designed, but the population doesn't work out properly to combine south Bergen with Paterson on these numbers. An alternative would be to combine Paterson with the Republican suburbs in northern Bergen County (rather than the marginal surburbs in western/southwestern Bergen County), but that doesn't really make any more sense from a communities of interest perspective (doesn't make less sense, either, though). The choice is basically between this map, which creates NJ-08 and NJ-09 as probably around D+8 and D+2, or an alternative version combining Paterson with northern Bergen County that makes both districts about D+5. Neither is satisfactory, really.

[Verily]

Yes there is. Newark has a distinctly white/Latino North and East Ward (Hispanic district) and three largely black wards (Payne). These constituents have differing concerns. Jersey City has one and a half black wards and four and half Asian-Latino-White wards. Moreover, if you drive thru North Newark or the Ironbound its more like Hudson County than the rest of Newark, so that part should be in Pascrell or Sires and not Payne. Other communities have similar divides.

Verily did you mean 2000 or 2010 numbers?

2000, as Vazdul requested.

Also, the racial divides within JC or Newark are not enormous enough to be worth splitting municipalities over. Now, if either JC or Newark were large enough for more than one district, it would be fairly clear which parts should be split off (well, maybe; I would probably split Downtown JC and Newport from the rest of JC first)--but that's not necessary. However, it is equally clear that, for example, the Bergen-Lafayette district of JC has much stronger connections to the rest of JC than it does to Irvington or East Orange even though Bergen-Lafayette is overwhelmingly black.

[Verily]

The thing about combining Rothman and Garrett is where Garrett lives. A "fair fight" district in Bergen is totally feasible, but a district that includes a large portion of Bergen and stretches all of the way out to Sussex is almost impossible due to population constraints and very unlikely to be a fair fight. I suppose they could put Garrett and Frelinghuysen (or Garrett and Lance) together and then make Rothman's district marginal to "compensate" (unfair since Republicans are already overrepresented, and Lance's district is obviously the one that "should" be eliminated, in addition to Pallone being drawn out of his district [but the district itself surviving as a D seat], but whatever), but that doesn't seem like what the commission is suggesting.