Group to again lobby Harrisburg lawmakers for 'People's Maps' over traditional Pa. politics

A citizens group that solicited public input to create “People’s Maps” to guide officials in drawing new legislative districts for the Pennsylvania General Assembly will make a final pitch on Monday.

Carol Kuniholm, executive director of Fair Maps Pennsylvania, will make her pitch for the House and Senate maps, created with input from more than 1,000 state residents. Several witnesses are scheduled to testify at the 4 p.m. hearing before the Legislative Reapportionment Commission, which will be livestreamed.

The five-member commission — comprising Senate Majority Leader Kim Ward, R-Hempfield; Senate Minority Leader Jay Costa, D-Forest Hills; House Majority Leader Kerry Benninghoff, R-Centre/Mifflin; House Minority Leader Joanna McClinton, D-Philadelphia; and University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Emeritus Mark Nordenberg — is on a tight deadline to create new maps for the state’s 253 legislative seats that align with 2020 census findings.

The General Assembly also is on a deadline to create new congressional districts in line with census results, which call for Pennsylvania to lose a district — down to 17 seats in Congress.

The new maps likely will include significant changes to align with population loss in Western Pennsylvania. The maps must be in the hands of counties by Jan. 24. Candidates can begin circulating petitions Feb. 15 to secure a place on the May 17, 2022, primary ballot.

Maps traditionally are drawn behind closed doors, with members of the Legislative Reapportionment Commission lobbying for versions that protect valued incumbents. But this year, during a series of hearings across the state, they’ve taken input from residents as well as public officials and civic leaders who are concerned about the process that might well determine who will represent them for the next 10 years.

While citizens have been shut out of the process in the past, the development of free mapping software that Fair Districts PA made available online allowed common folk to put their best efforts into creating maps that meet the three-pointed criteria of being compact, contiguous and not divide municipalities, insofar as possible.

Residents were game for the challenge, Kuniholm said, noting that more than 1,000 people contributed to the maps the group recently unveiled.

The House and Senate Citizens Maps that have been submitted to the commission are available online at the Fair Districts website.

“Fair Districts PA supporters and allies believe that electoral districts belong to all of us, and that all of us should have a say in how districts are drawn,” Kuniholm said. “The People’s Maps are significant improvements over existing districts.”

“We started our People’s Maps from a blank sheet. Our goal was not to protect incumbents but to draw maps that provided much fairer representation for all Pennsylvanians,” she said.

In addition to creating maps it believes meets criteria for fair mapping, minus political considerations, the group created a repository of citizen testimony from various hearings the Legislative Reapportionment Commission and various House and Senate committees have held across the state over the past year.

Karen Calhoun, volunteer coordinator for Fair District’s efforts in Somerset and Westmoreland counties, said she is encouraged by the interest residents have shown in the process. She hopes the commission, which is in charge of mapping legislative districts, and the General Assembly, which will create new congressional districts, take heed that people are watching.

“They are very aware we are watching and that we’ve educated many citizens on what to expect,” Calhoun said.

How much testimony at public hearings and the citizen maps will ultimately matter is unclear. Lawmakers have been known to create maps that move districts from one end of the state to the other midway through terms.

Ward declined to comment on specifics regarding citizen input, saying simply, “I think there was value in some of the testimony that was given during our public hearings.”