CLEVELAND — Monday evening, some Cleveland residents rallied against the city council president’s newly proposed ward map, which is expected to go before council for a vote for approval on January 6th.
Council leadership is required to redraw ward boundaries every ten years, and because of population decline, the body is now dropping from 17 to 15 wards.
Rally organizers said at a first glance, the new maps look fair, but upon a closer review, they are raising some concerns.
The board of elections recently moved the deadline for the new ward map up to January, rather than the spring.
Still, those rallying are asking Council president Blaine Griffin to make changes to the map and delay the vote to give more time for public input.
The current Ward 12, which is represented by Council member Rebecca Maurer, was divided into six wards, pitting Maurer against Ward 5 Council member Richard Starr for re-election in 2025.
Protesters said there are other, smaller block-by-block decisions they believe were made in the interest of protecting current members. Shaker Square, for example, is divided into two wards under the new map.
Matthew Ahn, a local attorney and resident, said it’s vital to keep neighborhoods intact.
“People come out to vote if they feel like their vote makes a difference, and when their ward is drawn in such a way to split neighborhoods and to make it difficult to tell which ward you’re in, people don’t necessarily see the same connection between their votes and what happens in our city government,” Ahn said. “And that is what I’m worried about.”
In a press conference earlier this month, Griffin said the redistricting process was transparent and fair, but difficult decisions had to be made when dropping two wards. He said he took public input into account when making the maps after hosting a series of three community meetings earlier this year.
Maurer, who was invited to the rally by residents, said she will not be voting to approve the proposed map.
She said she is supporting an initiative to give residents the power to draw ward boundaries moving forward.
“I wish I could say that we were getting through it without politics and sort of drawing around council members’ houses this time,” Maurer said. “But that doesn’t seem to be what’s happening. And so I’ve been calling for us to support a charter change where we take line drawing out of the hands of the council members and making sure that our maps this time around are as fair as possible.”
City council is resuming their meetings on Jan. 6, when they’re expected to vote on the new map.