State officials are seeking your input as the Alabama Legislature prepares to redraw district lines to reflect the results of the 2020 Census. Public hearings have been scheduled statewide for September for you to share your input and concerns about your voting district.
Every ten years, the Alabama Legislature redraws the lines for congressional, legislative and state school board districts. These lines reflect the results of the census.
The Alabama Legislature’s Joint Reapportionment Committee is conducting these public hearings. The federal Census Bureau recently released redistricting data from the 2020 Census . That will show how many people live in a particular district. Alabama had already received good news in April when the Census Bureau reported that the state’s overall population grew more than expected, to a tad more than 5 million, enough for the state to keep its seven congressional seats.[Source: al.com]
Sen. Jim McClendon, R-Springville, co-chair of the Legislature’s reapportionment committee, said he does not expect a problem with the timeline unless the COVID-19 pandemic interferes with lawmakers meeting. McClendon said he has asked the governor’s office to call the special session for the week of October 18 but has not received an answer.
Federal and state laws require that all districts of the same type – for example, all State Senate districts – have equal populations. The purpose of redistricting is to correct for population shifts among districts in the 10 years since the last federal census. As a result of redistricting, district boundaries may be changed. [Source: al.com]
As Alabama’s redistricting public hearings kick off this week, members of several stakeholder groups agreed that fair districting and fair representation are needed to ensure a broader understanding of issues faced by all communities.
Reporters from across Alabama and ethnic media reporters from across the nation joined a virtual media briefing held collectively by Alabama Values, the state’s communication hub, and Ethnic Media Services on Thursday, Aug. 26, to discuss what is at stake for underrepresented communities.
During the day’s briefing, reporters heard from Evan Milligan, executive director of Alabama Forward; Rodreshia Russaw, executive director of The Ordinary People Society and part of the Alabama Election Protection Network; Felicia Scalzetti, a CROWD fellow; Valerie Adams, co-founder and president of the Alabama Indigenous Coalition; Ana Espino, executive director of the Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice; and Jaeyeon Irene Do of Alabama-Korea Education and Economic Partnership.
Milligan said the recent Census data release has brought a lot of interesting things about Alabama’s population.
“Our state has grown in population by 6.3 percent since 2010. We are now at more than 5 million people,” he said. “Our pace of growth is behind the stronger economic neighbors here in the Deep South such as Florida and the Carolinas, Tennessee and Georgia, but we are outpacing our neighbors to the west in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas.”
Milligan said international migration has helped increase the population as well as a surge in domestic migration — people moving back to the state or first-time Alabamians.
Census data shows Alabama’s white population is shrinking, while people of color are growing.
Among new Alabamians are 43,722 African Americans, 78,445 Hispanics, 22,981 Asians, and 5,407 people who self-identified as American Indian/Native Alaskan. The white population, however, is down by 33,051.
Russaw is working to educate the public as well as inmates on prison Gerrymandering. Prison Gerrymandering happens when inmates are counted as being part of the population where the prison is located rather than in the Census count where they live.
“Alabama has systemically placed prisons in rural, more white areas so that population count is part of the Census data,” Russaw said. “What we have done is ensuring that inmates are voting from their home address and that decreases the count.”
Russaw also spoke about the Alabama Election Protection Network’s Our Districts, Our Alabama initiative to bring awareness to the redistricting public hearings coming up. AEPN aims to educate, connect, train and engage as many Alabamians as possible on redistricting.
Adams spoke on the need for more equitable education in Alabama regarding Native Americans.
“My observation of Alabama is it can do so much more in how our institutions, the media, and our government on how we are represented,” Adams said. “Less than 3 percent of Native Americans have been actively in office in Alabama.”
Espino said that language barriers are among the issues faced by the Latinx community in Alabama in understanding issues that are important to their communities. She gave specific examples stemming from the recent pandemic in which Alabamians who are non-native English speakers had difficulty understanding the information provided about the pandemic.
Irene Do had similar sentiments for the Korean community in Alabama. She shared data that showed there are approximately 20,000 Korean-Alabamians living in Montgomery, Prattville, and Auburn.
“When Koreans come, they don’t come alone,” she said. “They bring their families. They attend schools, are active in communities and churches.” Do said that Korean-Alabamians face difficulties with the culture and language barriers. These difficulties range from translation issues when communicating with their children’s teachers to medical emergencies and communicating with doctors and nurses. “We need more support and voices,” she said.
Overall, Alabama’s underrepresented communities all seek equitable representation and understanding. That’s why this cycle of redistricting is so important.
The hearings will start on September 1 and will end September 16. Hearings will be held in 27 counties, and are located across the state so that a hearing is either in every country or in an adjacent county.
The public can participate online through Microsoft Teams. They can also attend in person. Most of the 28 hearings will be held at community colleges across the state.
The first is Wednesday at 9 a.m. at Drake State Community College in Huntsville. Three others follow on Wednesday – at Northwest Shoals Community College in Muscle Shoals at 11 a.m.; at Calhoun Community College in Tanner at 2 p.m.; and at Northeast Community College in Rainsville at 4 p.m.
Information gathered at the hearings will be posted on the Reapportionment Committee’s page, the Alabama Legislative website and will be made available for legislators to consider as they draw new district boundaries.
Attendance may be in person or virtually via Microsoft Teams. Information for attending a hearing via Teams will be published on the Committee’s website 24 hours before the hearing. For more information, contact the Reapportionment Committee at district@alsenate.gov or (334) 261-0706.
Additional information is available at the reapportionment office link at the Legislature’s website, including this year’s redistricting guidelines adopted by the Legislative committee.
2021 Legislative Reapportionment Public Hearings Schedule
https://www.al.com/news/2021/08/rural-alabama-is-shrinking-fast-2020-census-shows.html
Editor’s Note:
Bibb County decreased slightly in total population between 2020 & 2010. In the table below the first column of numbers is 2020 then 2010 followed by the % of change.
| 44 | Bibb County | 22,293 | 22,915 | −2.7% |
| 168 | Brent city | 2,972 | 4,947 | −39.9% |
| 174 | Centreville city | 2,800 | 2,778 | 0.8% |
| 288 | West Blocton town | 1,217 | 1,240 | −1.9% |
| 263 | Woodstock town | 1,472 | 1,428 | 3.1% |
