On September 15th and 16th, the Montana Districting and Apportionment Commission will hold hearings at Crow Agency and in Billings to receive public input on how to redraw Montana’s Legislative Districts and the bigger the crowd, the better to protect equal representation!
The next pages of this document show the exact time and place of these hearings and give you access, through the links provided, to the maps drawn by each of the Commissioners. The Republican maps would give their party 75% of the Legislative seats for the next 10 years. Our Democratic Commissioners did their jobs and drew maps that represented the true 57-43% distribution of voters in Montana per agreed upon recent election analysis.
You can access previous hearings and all the work the Commission has done so far at mtredistricting.gov. You should also check that website frequently to see what changes may be in the works and to keep track of different hearings and how things are going.
All of us have a stake in the results of the commission’s decisions, so your participation is critical!
Billings Regional Districts Hearing
Location: MSU-Billings Student Union Building Glacier Room
Date: Friday, September 16th
Times: 9 a.m. – 12 p.m. & 1:30 – 5 p.m.
Crow Agency Regional Districts Hearing
Location: Little Big Horn College Cultural Lodge
Date: Thursday, September 15th
Times: 1 p.m. – 4 p.m. & 6 p.m. – 9 p.m.
You should know
There is consistent commuting between Pryor and Billings every day. This commuting shows a clear community of interest between Billings and the Crow Reservation, and this Commission should reflect that community of interest in legislative districts to comply with Federal law and the Montana Constitution.
Billings is one of the few areas on the map where both parties have drawn multiple competitive districts. The public has repeatedly told this Commission that it wants competitive districts, and it should opt for one of the plans with multiple competitive seats.
HDP2 and HDP3 would create four Democratic leaning seats within Billings that Democrats have won a majority of the time in the 10 races that make up the Commission’s competitiveness metric. The Republican proposals pack as many Democrats into as few districts as possible. HDP1 only creates one seat for the entire city of Billings that has been won a majority of the time by Democrats, despite the fact that out of the 10 races this Commission is using for a competitiveness metric, Billings votes like the state as a whole, 43-57.
Packing Democrats into as few seats as possible doesn’t accurately reflect the way that our community votes as a whole and makes the map much less fair statewide. This Commission should opt for HDP2 or HDP3, because they fairly reflect our city and the state.
There is consistent and constant movement through the city of Billings every single day. Our communities aren’t limited to squares where people never leave. Having districts that take on a broad cross section of the city is what will accurately represent our community.
HDP2 and HDP3 are fair and proportional and meet all the criteria and goals of the Commission.
The Republican plans are partisan power grabs that have the statewide effect of unconstitutionally eliminating minority representation and enormously advantaging Republicans, in violation of this Commission’s criteria and goals.
Current Proposals
HDP1 Republican (Essmann): https://tinyurl.com/3yvbj2bm
HDP2 Democratic (Lamson): https://tinyurl.com/2p86ybyh
HDP3 Democratic (Miller): https://tinyurl.com/2s3dv8f3
HDP4 Republican (Stusek): https://tinyurl.com/325fs6eu