Census could reshape districts Political lines may be redrawn, giving Eastern Panhandle stronger presence

Rivard Daily Mail Capitol Reporter
February 15, 2010

The U.S. Census again may cause a reshaping of West Virginia's political structure, likely reducing the number of lawmakers representing the southern coalfields and giving Eastern Panhandle voters a louder voice in Charleston.

Results of the 2010 Census, which begins this spring, will be used to redraw legislative and congressional districts starting with the 2012 election.

Because many legislative districts, especially in the southern coalfields, have lost population since the last census in 2000, their boundaries will have to become larger to include more people.

But the quickly growing Eastern Panhandle will get smaller, denser districts and more of them, said Jo Vaughan, a redistricting analyst with the state Legislature.

Vaughan uses annual Census estimates to keep an eye on the state's population. The estimates are fairly reliable and allow lawmakers to begin talking about what will happen after official 2010 Census numbers are released for redistricting early next year.

The Eastern Panhandle population, which has grown as a result of Baltimore and Washington, D.C. suburban sprawl, could gain two new House of Delegate districts and also will surely elect at least one more senator, according to Panhandle lawmakers who are keeping an eye on the numbers.

Right now, coalfield lawmakers are prominent in both the House and Senate.

That includes Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin, D-Logan; Senate Majority Leader Truman Chafin, D-Mingo; and House Finance Chairman Harry Keith White, D-Mingo.

No Eastern Panhandle lawmakers hold top leadership roles.

That can lead to some disconnect between the fastest growing part of the state and what is currently the most politically influential, according to Eastern Panhandle officials.

“It's just, up in this area, being so far from Charleston, it feels as if — or people have the impression that — Charleston just doesn't understand,” said Sen. John Unger, D-Berkeley.

Unger, who is chairman of the Senate Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, may be the only Eastern Panhandle lawmaker in any kind of leadership role.

Delegate Daryl Cowles, R-Morgan, said if someone drew a straight line from Morgantown south, no legislative leader except Unger would be on the eastern side of the line, except perhaps Senate Finance Chairman Walt Helmick who represents the 15th district, and he would be right on the line.

The 15th includes six Panhandle counties, but both Helmick, D-Pocahontas, and Clark Barnes, R-Randolph, come from two of the district's non-Panhandle counties.

The 15th is likely to shift because of the Census in a way that guarantees the Eastern Panhandle counties will be able to elect at least one more senator in the future.

Stronger Panhandle

Dale Manuel, a former House of Delegates member from Jefferson County, said redistricting will give the Panhandle a stronger voice in the Legislature.

Manuel said one reason the Panhandle's Democratic delegation in the House doesn't have leadership roles is it didn't initially support current House Speaker Richard Thompson, D-Wayne.

“I think Rick Thompson does a fantastic job, but some of our people weren't on the right side of the speaker's race,” said Manuel, a member of the Jefferson County Commission.

But Thompson's request last week to tap into the state's rainy day fund to pay for winter storm cleanup struck Manuel as a nod to the Eastern Panhandle.

“‘I get it; I'm there as speaker' — that's the way I read it,” Manuel said.

Thompson also has said he may run for governor in 2012.

Eastern Panhandle residents have interests and concerns that differ from those of people in the rest of the state. The Panhandle, for instance, gets news from local papers that don't circulate in southern and central West Virginia, or from northern Virginia and D.C.-area media.

But there are also rubber-meets-the-road issues that Panhandle lawmakers don't think are being heard.

“Our issues are unique to the rest of the state and, in as much, they require unique solutions sometimes,” Cowles said. “Too often, with leadership being from not our area, we don't get a viable chance to have our solutions, our ideas or issues addressed.”

One big issue is supplemental pay for teachers and state employees who work in the Panhandle.

Officials say they have trouble keeping highly qualified teachers and public workers in Panhandle counties because they can get higher salaries across the border in Virginia and Maryland.

Location-based pay is controversial, especially because it would mean good teachers elsewhere in the state could be lured to border counties.

Economic gateway

Eastern Panhandle residents also say they would like to see more economic development dollars spent in their area, where the population is growing, rather than in the interior of the state, where it is mostly shrinking.

They say the Panhandle acts as a gateway to the rest of the state and putting new infrastructure in the interior of the state but not in the Panhandle doesn't make sense, especially if a business is looking to stay near D.C.

“We feel like that when you fund those kinds of infrastructure needs in Jefferson County, you get a return on your money — we do feel that — and it's probably a greater return than in other parts of the state,” Manuel said.

Still, lawmakers say the Legislature is always tasked with looking out for all of West Virginia and the divide isn't too staggering.

“I think it's important when we look at that, that we don't develop a mentality of them against us, because we're all one state and we all need to stick together,” Unger said.

A potential power shift away from the coalfields also does not yet appear to have much affect on lawmakers' ardent support for coal.

“I don't see it as a threat to coal, or to the northern steel or the chemical valley of Kanawha,” Cowles said. “I see it as a balancing out of what is long overdue.”

Kanawha may lose

Also following the 2010 Census, Kanawha County will almost certainly lose one of its four members of the state Senate.

The county, in a unique arrangement, has two overlapping Senate districts, the 8th and 17th.

“There's a good chance that the 8th and the 17th will not be able to maintain its boundaries,” redistricting analyst Vaughan said.

That means the two districts likely would become separate and the boundary for one of the districts might extend to include part of another county, perhaps Roane or Fayette.

Because a Senate district that includes more than one county can't have both its senators from the same county, it seems likely that — unless they establish residences in another county — Kanawha would lose one of its two senators who are up for reelection in 2012. Those two senators are Dan Foster and Corey Palumbo, both Democrats.

“Obviously redistricting is a political process, but the numbers show that Kanawha County may have a tough time documenting the need for four senators,” Foster said.

That's a good thing, said Unger, who challenged the redistricting plan in 2001 that kept four senators in Kanawha.

That year, the only way the Senate could let Kanawha retain four senators despite a loss in population in the 2000 Census was by allowing its two countywide districts to fall almost 6 percent below their ideal population, even though other districts varied by less than 5 percent above or below the ideal population.

That meant that the overall deviation of the plan was almost 11 percent, although courts had indicated that no more than 10 percent is permissible. Since then, Kanawha's population has shrunk further, meaning the deviation is perhaps higher now.

Three for Congress

Despite West Virginia's modest population growth since the last census, it likely will continue to send three representatives to the U.S. House of Representatives.

“We have three and we will maintain three,” Vaughan said.

But the boundaries of the districts will change to mirror population shifts.

The 3rd congressional district, which is currently represented by Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., will grow larger geographically because of the population decline.

The 2nd, which Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., now serves, likely will shrink and become denser because it includes the Eastern Panhandle.