2011-067 RES ADOPTING CRITERIA FOR REDISTRICTING OF POLITICAL BOUNDARIES

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ORDER AN ORDER OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PARIS ESTABLISHING CRITERIA FOR REDISTRICTING OF CITY POLITICAL BOLTNDARIES The City Council of the City of Paris, Texas, meeting in a duly scheduled and posted meeting, does hereby adopt the following criteria for use in the redistricting of all city political boundaries. Any plan for the redistricting of the City of Paris, or election precincts should, to the maximum extent possible, conform to the following criteria: The plan should insure that all applicable provisions of the U.S. and Texas Constitutions, the Voting Rights Act, the Texas Election Code are honored. 2. The plan should address minarity representation, and if at all possible in conformity with constitutional standards, avoid retrogression in the percentage of population and voting age demographics consistent with existing minority representation. The plan should preserve minority communities of interest. These communities of interest should be recognized and retained intact where possible. Only when the overall minority population of the City is sufficiently large, should the City require more than one minority district, should minority populations be divided and only then to the least degree possible. 4. The plan should not, however, attempt to unreasonably join geographically remote minority populations into a single precinct unless there are strong and genuine connections between these communities as reflected by common schools, churches, or cultural ties. For example, minority populations in two separate towns, located miles apart, may not have sufficient links or common political cohesion to justify joining these two minority population centers into a single electaral group. Particularly when dealing with distinct minority groups, such as Black and Hispanic populations, a general assumption that separate minority populations will vote in a"block" may be unsupportable in fact. The plan should seek compact and contiguous political boundaries. Physical boundaries such as rivers, which tend to divide populations in fundamental ways, should be recognized and communities of interest should be retained intact where possible. To the maximum extent possible, clearly recognized boundaries should be used to facilitate ease of voter identification of boundaries, as well as election administration. 6. Where possible, well-recognized and long used election precinct boundaries should be retained intact (within the limitations imposed by state and federal law) or with as little alteration as possible. 7. Election precincts in the plans should be sized in conformity with state law. For example, in cities that use traditional, hand counted paper ballots, no election precinct may contain more than 2000 voters. In cities with voting systems that allow for automated ballot counting, this number may be increased to as many as 5000 voters. The plan should afford incumbent office holders with the assurance that they will continue to represent tlle majority of individuals who elected these incumbents, and all incumbents' residential locations should be retained in their reformed precincts to insure continuity in leadership during the remaining term of incumbents. ~Y~+1t31T ~