Drawing inspiration from a few other entries, I decided to revisit my map of last weekend, and target Weiner much more for elimination rather than draw a "fair fight" between him and Ackerman, which is what I had originally opted to do. I also fixed the Meeks and Rangel seats from my previous version, making them now majority African-American and majority Hispanic, respectively, from my previous version. Finally, as a consequence of transforming Rangel's seat into a majority Hispanic one, it means that Crowley's is not; as a result, I was able to feed more Queens Hispanics into Velasquez's seat to make that one majority Hispanic now as well. So, there are now 3 Hispanic seats in NYC and 3 African-American ones. I also ensured that every incumbent member of congress not targeted for elimination lives in the actual district I have designed for him or her to run in. This is an important point: if a map is hammered out via the state legislature, it will be an incumbent protection one; therefore, you will not see vacant seats created even if geographically convenient. On the other hand, if courts draw the map, I can easily see a south Brooklyn district being created and both Ackerman and Weiner getting the ax.
Let's go to the map....
District 1 - blue (Bishop-D): Improves partisan score a bit by grabbing areas of Central Islip. If the name of the game is incumbent protection, this will be what Bishop demands. O 55.8% - M 43.2%
District 2 - green (King-R): Takes Smithtown off the hands of both of the Democratic seats surrounding it. King might not like this district, though, as it is now majority Suffolk County. But I drew it anyways, to accommodate the retention of a VRA seat in SE Queens-Nassau, which the DOJ might require anyway. O 44.4% - M 55.2%
District 3 - purple (Israel-D): Moves much more into Nassau to become a central Island seat. Tried to keep the partisan makeup almost the same as now. O 55.3% - M 43.9%
District 4 - red (Meeks-D): VRA African-American seat: In order to retain its VRA status, it moves into heavily African-American villages in Nassau County like Hempstead and Roosevelt. It pulls out of non-black areas of Queens that the district had been previous comprised of. It is possible to improve the African-American percentage further, but doing so would be uglier and I wanted to keep the lines at least somewhat reasonable. Besides, uglier lines might cause this district be struck down as violating Gingles. w 21.4%, b 51.4% h 18.9%, a 4.4%; 51.3% b by VAP. O 81.3% - M 18.3%
District 5 - yellow (McCarthy-D vs. Weiner-D): This is where I dumped Weiner's home. Is he really going to play well out in Long Island? I don't believe so. Weiner's district has been split six ways under my map: the Brooklyn portions being divided between Towns, Clarke, and Nadler; the Queens parts between this district, Meeks, and Ackerman. McCarthy may not like having to become an urban politician now, and alternatively you could give her the rest of the North Shore and diminish her proportion of Queens (although any shoring up of District 4 for VRA purposes would require her to take a healthy chunk of Queens). But I wanted to keep all incumbents in the districts I have designated for them, as this kind of courtesy will be what the state legislature does, if they do agree on a map. By moving into Queens in a big way, this district now also becomes majority-minority. 44.5% w, 11.5% b, 18.4% h, 19.4% a. O 59.6% - M 39.7%
District 6 - teal (Ackerman-D): Ackerman gets a district very similar to his current one, except moving a bit westward in Queens to swap Hispanic precincts for Asian ones with Crowley so that this district becomes an "Asian opportunity" district once Ackerman retires. Weiner could run here but the lion's share of turf is Ackerman's. 43.4% w, 2.8% b, 15.8% h, 35.9% a. O 60.5% - M 38.7%
District 7 - black (Crowley-D): Crowley's district extends west to Astoria and pulls a little out of Bronx as well as heavily-Hispanic precincts in Jackson Heights, so that Velasquez's district now becomes majority-Hispanic. It is possible, of course, to transform Crowley's district into a majority Hispanic seat. Doing this, though, would probably result in neither Rangel's nor Velasquez's seats becoming majority-Hispanic. So, by leaving Crowley's seat largely as it is now, demographically, you gain two new Hispanic VRA seats versus just one. And Crowley gets accommodated in a huge way by his friend Shelly Silver in the process. w 28.2%, b 12.9%, h 42.2%, a 14.1%. O 78.9% - M 20.3%
District 8 - dark red (Velasquez-D): New Majority Hispanic VRA Seat : Very similar to the current configuration except to make this majority-Hispanic, it goes a bit further into Queens and recedes from Greenpoint and northern Williamsburg in Brooklyn. It also pulls out of Chinatown and heavily Asian areas of Sunset Park. This is the district I have the most doubts about, regarding Gingles. It is stringy no doubt, but the current district is as well, and that district has been upheld by the courts. w 22.3%, b 8.2%, h 52.5%, a 14.3%, 50.1% h by VAP. O 84.2% - M 15.1%.
District 9 - sky blue (Towns-D): I decided in Brooklyn to keep the boundaries almost identical between the two African-American seats, simply expanding them southward a bit to gain the necessary population. For those readers not from NY and/or familiar with the reasoning behind why these seats have been drawn this way for the past few decades, it is this: Caribbean-born blacks and blacks born in the U.S. have long been political rivals in Brooklyn, and the districts are drawn to put these constituencies in different districts. I believe Towns's district is for U.S. born African-Americans while the Clarke district was designed in 1982 originally to be a district where Caribbeans would be a dominant political force. 26.8% w, 51.3% b, 15.4% h, 4.3% a; 51.7% b by VAP. O 84.2% - M 15.4%.
District 10 - indigo (Clarke-D). Expands southward a bit bit as well as takes a bit more of Park Slope. 27.4% w, 51.3% b, 13.1% h, 5.6% a; 51.3% b by VAP. O 89.5% - M 10.0%.
District 11 - light green (Grimm-R): Expands slightly to gain necessary population by taking Bensonhurst now. O 49.2% - M 50.0%. I am not sure Shelly Silver will consent to making this seat safe for Team Red; but if he does, you could easily swap Bensonhurst out for some of Borough Park.
District 12 - steel blue (Nadler-D): Finishes the elimination of the old NY-9 by taking a few areas around Coney Island from that old district but then goes north a bit in Manhattan to encompass much more of the Upper West Side. Loses a bit of downtown area to Maloney's seat, though. O 70.5% - M 28.6%
District 13 - salmon (Maloney-D): Pulls out of Queens entirely and grabs Greenpoint and northern Williamsburg instead. Also expands a bit in Manhattan, with the functional boundary between the "East Side and West Side" districts now being Columbus Avenue. I did this so that the 14th could become majority-Hispanic; in order to achieve this, it has to pull out of very white areas of the Upper West Side, which ought to go in Nadler's district. 80.2% O - 16.9% M
District 14 - olive (Rangel-D): New Majority Hispanic VRA Seat. Extends a bit now into heavily Hispanic areas of the Bronx so that this district becomes majority Hispanic. Of course, the CVAP data might prove otherwise, which is why I tried to keep this as close as I could to 60% Hispanic without double-crossing between the Bronx and Manhattan in the 14th and 15th. 10.6% w, 27.4% b, 57.3% h, 2.8% a; 55.0% h by VAP. O 93.9% - M 5.5%
District 15 - orange (Serrano-D): Goes eastward and northward a bit to accommodate the creation of the 14th as a Hispanic-majority district. 5.0% w, 28.6% b, 62.0% h, 2.6% a; 60.5% h by VAP. O 93.1% - M 6.6%
District 16 - green (Engel-D): Retained same basic district as my first proposal over the weekend: all of Rockland, a connector through Tarrytown, Dobbs Ferry, Ardsley, and part of Yonkers, and then the rest of the Bronx. This way Lowey gets an entirely Westchester-based seat. 43.8% w, 24.0% b, 24.7% h, 5.3% a. O 66.4% - M 32.9%
So, there you have it for NY-1 through NY-16. The NY-9 has been sliced and diced six possible ways, ensuring Weiner has no place to run. The old NY-6 (now NY-4) has been retained as a VRA African-American district by extending into Nassau now. Rangel's seat has been made from minority-majority into majority-Hispanic now, as has Velasquez's. Crowley's district, although geographically slightly different from before, is about the same demographically, which ought to make him very happy. And Ackerman's seat gains a bit more Asians, which only seems right given we are taking about NE Queens.
