You've heard about King County (which includes Seattle) from the Governor's race. But you may not know that county voters voted to reduce the county council from 13 to 9 members and voted on an accelerated timetable to redistrict by January 15th, 2005 (Yow!).
The council is now 7 Dems and 6 Repugs. 1 of each is not running for reelection (in 2005), leaving 11 incumbants for 9 seats. Four proposals are out (Maps here) and if you're a KC resident you can comment online. Public hearings in the next few days, too. But do it soon.
Seattle PI has an article on in today. More below.
Update [2005-1-5 16:33:30 by dgb]: New Seattle PI article.
There's a semi-independent 5-member commission that will make the final proposal to the council. 2 were picked by Dems, 2 by Reps and the 4 together picked the chairman.
My opinion is that with 11 incumbants (6 Dems and 5 Repugs), it would be most fair to pit 2 Dems against each other and 2 Repugs against each other. Additionally, there should be minimal gerrymandering. Plan D looks the best to me. 2 Dems would compete for the 2nd district and 2 Reps would compete for the 3rd district. There would be 3 essentially urban districts, 4 suburban (north, east, south and way south) and 2 exurban districts. It makes the most sense.
Proposals A and B were made by the Repugs. In either none of the 5 Repugs would have to run against a Repug. 2 Dems would compete and another Dem (from south of Seattle would have to compete with a Repug, I think). It may not be as bad as Texas, but it always seems the Repugs are trying to use the system to their advantage. If they have their way they could take control of the council 5-4 in this most Democratic counties of a Democratic State.