The Norwich Board of Civil Authority (BCA) is against the House redistricting proposal put forth by the Legislative Apportionment Board (LAB). The Norwich BCA submitted a formal response to the LAB last week. The BCA’s for Sharon, Strafford and Thetford are also against the change from a four town district.
As noted in a prior post, Norwich, Sharon, Strafford and Thetford currently comprise the Windsor-Orange 2 district. It has two representatives in the Vermont House of Representatives. Seeking to create single member districts across the State, the LAB proposed to split the current Windsor-Orange 2 district into two House districts, each with one representative. To balance population, the LAB split Norwich into the two districts.
The general view of the Norwich BCA was that the four-town district worked fine. Moreover, it was important that all of Norwich be in one House district. Norwich BCA Chair Linda Gray said in an email to me that the BCA provided the following formal feedback to the LAB.
The Norwich BCA prioritizes maintaining all of the town in the same district and prefers maintaining the current district. This two-member district does not present the problems that some multi-member districts do, because it is relatively compact and there is affinity among the four towns. If the LAB insists on proposing a single-member district, the Norwich BCA would accept that only if all of Norwich is in that district.
Representatives from the BCA’s for Norwich, Sharon, Strafford and Thetford met on November 8, according to draft meeting minutes. There was consensus that the four-town district serves the communities well. Andrew Lane from Strafford also conveyed the view that “smaller towns would actually have a diminished voice if paired with a larger town in a two-town district,” said the minutes.
Next steps
The LAB is meeting several times this month to discuss feedback from BCA’s across the State and to work on map adjustments. The LAB’s final map is also subject to modification by the Legislature. In addition, the LAB is looking at Senate districts. At issue there is the apportionment of 30 Senate seats.
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Contact me at norwichobserver [at] gmail.com