Reapportionment commission works on public outreach

KINGSTON, N.Y. » Members of the Ulster County Commission on Reapportionment have begun to flesh out how the commission will share its work and communicate with the public as it crafts the county Legislature’s districts for the next decade.

During a meeting last week, commission members agreed to create an email account through which members of the public can offer their input about the process and to form a subcommittee to look at how the 2010 commission used its website to communicate its efforts.

Commission members also began preliminary discussions about whether, like the prior commission, it would hold meetings targeted toward different geographic regions of the county and whether the public would be allowed to comment during commission meetings.

Some members suggested reaching out to county legislators and other politicos as a first step, though others worried that to seek opinions from those who would benefit from how the lines are drawn could lead to gerrymandering.

“It seems to me a strange ask to make of the Ulster County Legislature if this is supposed to be about their

lines,” said Sarah DeStefano, who was leading the commission during the recent meeting. “I would think that this inquiry should be more about the voters and less about the voted-in.

“If we’re going to be asking legislators what they think we should be doing with their boundaries, we’re bound to get answers that are ... favorable

to their legislative electoral possibilities,” she said.

Commission member Andy Monk said input from county lawmakers could be useful particularly if there are any “big issues” with the current district boundaries, as long as commission members were cognizant of where the information was coming from.

The seven-member Commission on Reapportionment is charged with using 2020 U.S. Census data to redraw the county’s legislative district lines to reflect population

shifts within the county. It must adopt a redistricting plan no later than July 20, 2022, and the new lines are to be in place for the November 2023 election of county legislators.

On Friday, the U.S. Census Bureau announced the final census data the commission will use to redraw the district lines won’t be available until the end of this coming September, six months later in the year than the last time district boundaries were redrawn.

Preliminary 2020 U.S.

Census data suggests Ulster County’s population has declined by roughly 3.2% over the past decade, to about 176,728 from the 182,493 residents in the county at the time of the 2010 Census, according to Robert Leibowitz, principal planner for the county Planning Department.

That means when the new lines are drawn, each of the county’s 23 legislative districts will have roughly 7,683 residents, down from the roughly 7,934 residents in the districts established based on the 2010 population.