The Carmel City Council appears poised to support a redistricting plan proposed by councilor Sue Finkam rather than five others submitted by the public.
At the Oct. 15 meeting, Finkam explained how her plan better meets guidelines adopted by the council this summer for updating the city council districts. The city is adding two new councilors in 2020 – with one being elected at-large – as a result of becoming a second-class city.
“We looked at a variety of other plans, but when we did the tests, particularly for ideal population, this is the one that had the tightest deviation and that’s what we were trying to drive,” said Finkam, who is serving as the city’s redistricting coordinator.
Finkam used equations to measure compactness, uniformity and population distribution in the proposed districts and said her plan scored best on each. None of the other plans meet all the guidelines, she said.
Finkam’s plan creates the west, north, central, northeast, southwest and southeast districts. Each has between 15,000 and 15,600. The five incumbent councilors currently elected to represent a district reside within separate districts in the proposed plan. The proposed western district is not home to any current councilors.
The council hired consultants from Kroger, Gardis & Regas to help develop a plan. So far, the city has paid the firm nearly $14,000 for its assistance.
Several Carmel residents expressed concerns with Finkam’s plan during the meeting. Dee Fox said it appears to be a conflict of interest to have councilors and consultants with ties to the mayor in charge of redrawing their own districts.
“The districts on this map appear mainly to preserve and protect the districts of current mayor-favored councilors with a glaring inequality and out of proportion disruption of councilor Tony Green’s southwest Carmel district,” she said. “This plan would take half of his precinct and split up southwest Carmel. It’s hard to see that as a coincidence or necessarily the only arrangement when election history shows the mayor did not carry southwest Carmel.”
Green, who joined the council in early 2017 after a caucus vote, is the only current councilor not supported by the mayor in the previous city council election. Finkam said Green’s proposed district has the most changes because of the massive population growth on the west side of the city and the annexation of Home Place, which would move from the southeast district to the southwest under her proposal.
The council sent the redistricting plan to the Finance, Utilities and Rules Committee, which has not announced a meeting date. The council is expected to meet Nov. 5 to discuss revisions to the plan. A certified copy of the final ordinance is planned to be submitted to the clerk of the Hamilton County Circuit Court by Dec. 5.
