Geography matters

Last week I created a Google map of all of the candidates in Orange County in this year's municipal and school board races. Now excellent electoral map maker Damon Seils has added two very helpful resources: a map of every polling site in the county, and another map of the voting precincts. All of these maps will be permanently available on the election info page: http://orangepolitics.org/elections-2007

Now watch what happens when I combine the candidate map with the precinct map. Pretty cool, huh?

Here are some of the interesting comments from a previous thread about maps and geographic distribution of the candidates:

Can someone explain why most of the school board candidates cluster on one side of the town? Is there something I'm unaware of about the structure of the election or is it just an intriguing happenstance?
- Priscilla Murphy

I had the same question about the map, Priscilla. It's interesting to see the geographic clusters of candidates. School board in the far northeast of town and Chapel Hill folks (roughly) between Estes and Franklin. There are also all those Carrboro candidates in the northern area, but that I can understand.
- Ruby Sinreich

My only observation from the map is that I couldn't possibly afford to live on that side of town. :)

I would be curious, however, to know which schools that candidates raised their children in. Which schools are ‘unrepresented' in the contest, or on the school board in general?
- Jason Baker

Jason, with seven seats, nine elementary schools, four middle schools, and two high schools, representation would be difficult. It might be worth looking and the feeds (elem to ms to hs) over the years, but they change as a result of redistricting. [...] Does anyone think we need districts for the School Board or the Town Council?
- Fred Black

As much redistricting as is done as I don't see any value in district wide seats for the BOE.

Rather than districts for the TC or BOA, I'd like to see us actively recruit and support candidates who are lower income.
- Terri Buckner

The distribution of reps does matter. For two years of my term on the council, I was the only person who lived on the south side of CH, while the council was primarily composed of people who lived in the north. It was hard for me to get people interested in problems of South Columbia Street when they rarely used the street in their daily lives. On the other hand, I was never an expert on Weaver Dairy Rd and its development issues.

What I found was that, while we had no formal districts, we did yield to other councilmembers who lived near the housing project, road widening, etc., for their daily experiences. Ruby's map is superb, and I would be concerned if the bulk of the school board members came from one area of the district, especially with all the effort the school board puts into redistricting, to mix and match the kids in specific schhols by various categories.
- Joe Capowski

It's certainly possible to have a representative board without districts, but part of the responsibility for ensuring this falls on the voters, who lack options without geographically disbursed candidates. It's certainly no fault of the candidates, but it's still important to examine it. A lack of equal representation does not mean poor results or poor decisions, however I hope that people lend a slightly higher level of scrutiny to the candidates to ensure that we continue with high standards for all of our schools.

To echo what Joe said, from my experience as a council candidate and a transportation board member, I certainly have been able to bring more to the table when considering projects downtown and along the Franklin Street corridor, having never lived more than a five minute walk from Franklin. I would hope to be able to defer to someone else for ground-level advice on areas I spend less time in. Diverse representation doesn't just prevent unfair attention to a particular area/class/race/etc, it helps make sure that all decisions made are the best, most informed decisions possible.
- Jason Baker