Council advances new map with north, south, east wards
Councilors are nearly ready to approve a city ward map that splits West Laramie, the west side, and the downtown area. The council rejected a map that kept those neighborhoods together.
Laramie will likely be split into north, south and east wards when the city council reconvenes next week to cast its final redistricting vote.
The new divisions dictate where and for whom residents of the city vote when they head to the polls in November. The council has considered half a dozen maps in the last month, balancing concerns about communities of interest, proportional representation, anticipated housing developments and even voter confidentiality.
“All of the maps we’ve looked at, at least in my opinion, have merits and also present problems,” Mayor Paul Weaver said. “I don’t think there was an outcome where everybody — all nine councilors and all of our constituents — were going to say, ‘I’m totally and completely satisfied with the way things played out.’”
The council debated various contender maps during its meeting Tuesday, eventually approving the map designated “Proposal 1G.”
In advancing this map, the council accepted one suggestion from Albany County Clerk Jackie Gonzales, while rejecting another. Gonzales had asked the council to keep West Laramie whole.
Proposal 1G splits Laramie into roughly north, south and east wards. It splits West Laramie, the west side neighborhood and the downtown area, dividing the population of each between Wards 1 and 2. The map fortifies the current university dorm precinct against a threat to the privacy of the vote, and creates nine precincts in total.
The north-south-east split is similar to the council’s previous favorite, Proposal 1B. Both maps split West Laramie, dividing its residents between Wards 1 and 2.
Proponents of that plan argued that putting West Laramie residents into multiple wards would give them more representation on council. There would be six councilors, rather than the current three, with constituents west of tracks.
Councilor Andi Summerville was the first to advance this argument, but in a letter to council delivered last week, County Clerk Gonzales voiced her opposition to the split.
“We believe West Laramie is a community of interest with overwhelmingly overlapping interests in representation,” Gonzales writes. “While we do appreciate and respect the idea of establishing a greater number of ties between West Laramie and city representatives, this does not necessarily increase the quality of these ties.”
On either of the maps that split West Laramie, Ward 1 would have 2,000 residents west of the tracks and Ward 2 would have 2,400 residents west of the tracks. But each ward would have more than 10,000 residents, making West Laramie a minority in both wards.
“Less than a quarter of the people in each Ward reside in West Laramie,” Gonzales writes. “While the numbers likely speak for themselves, we believe that the interests of West Laramie cannot be properly represented when its voting population is split up and attached to two larger populations. This is not a precedent that we want to set in the City of Laramie, and we would like to advocate for a reconsideration of this route.”
In addition to the county clerk, Councilors Brian Harrington and Erin O’Doherty pushed back on the split.
“By splitting the west side and West Laramie, the intent was to give them more of a voice,” O’Doherty said during the meeting Tuesday. “But I can’t imagine any universe where this is true.”
O’Doherty proposed an alternative map, Proposal 3-3, which kept West Laramie together and cut Laramie into roughly diagonal west, central and east strips.
Another benefit to 3-3, O’Doherty said, is that it more closely follows House Districts and creates just six precincts. All city residents in HD-14, for example, would find themselves in Ward 3. And all city residents in HD-46 would find themselves in Ward 1. This would simplify the creation of ballots and potentially make it easier for residents to keep track of who represents them.
But several councilors took issue with O’Doherty’s map. Vice-Mayor Jayne Pearce said it was irresponsible to make the central ward — which contains the dorms and a significant amount of off-campus student housing — the largest. On O’Doherty’s map, that ward is indeed the largest at 10,900 residents (the other wards are about 10,200 each).
Pearce – like many of the city councilors and some of Albany County’s legislators – believes that the 2020 Census undercounted Laramie’s population. The census was conducted largely during the spring of 2020, when university instruction moved entirely online and many students chose to complete that semester from their parents’ home.
In drawing the new ward boundaries, councilors should keep that undercount in mind, Pearce said.
“I can’t see this map withstanding the test of time, assuming that we actually get a good count eight years from now,” she said.
Councilor Fred Schmechel raised a concern that he has raised at previous meetings: that West Laramie is treated as uniquely divisible, whereas no one seeks to split the tree neighborhood in half to increase its representation.
“I still question why the West Laramie neighborhood is singled out as a neighborhood that can be divided, but no other neighborhoods can,” he said. “No one has really given me what I would consider a satisfactory answer on that, but I do recognize that this map treats most neighborhoods equally.”
Ultimately, Proposal 3-3 was defeated on a close 4-5 vote.
Instead, the council advanced Proposal 1G. Summerville, who introduced the map, said the new map made two significant changes to its predecessor 1B.
First, the new map seeks to smooth out a significant issue raised by its predecessor — namely, the uncertain future of the University of Wyoming dorms.
Given the location of House District lines — which were finalized Friday evening — the ward lines on 1B carved out a precinct in central Laramie containing, essentially, just the University of Wyoming dorms and the residents of Sorority and Fraternity Row.
That would be fine for now, as the precinct would have a census population of 1,884 and 204 registered voters. But the UW dorms are scheduled for demolition in 2026 and will likely move to a new precinct (though they would stay in the same ward). The result would be a precinct population of 38 registered voters.
“The existence of 38 voters in an entire precinct is a grave threat to voter confidentiality; this area’s status as its own precinct is entirely unacceptable when considering the needs of elections within the City of Laramie,” Gonzales writes. “While the population numbers are technically adequate at this moment in time, it will only be four years before this area is unconstitutional based on the current University of Wyoming plan.”
To fix this, the new map extends that precinct four blocks south of Grand Avenue, scooping up more population and more voters, so that the precinct works with or without the dorms.
Second, the new map splits downtown between Wards 1 and 2. Summerville said she was inspired to do this following a call from a constituent.
“The core of downtown was all in Ward 1 and the constituent asked that we consider moving that to create some downtown space both in Ward 2 and in Ward 1.”
Now, the dividing line cuts through downtown along Grand Avenue.
Public Commenter and former Albany County Commission candidate Klaus Halbsgut said he was opposed to splitting up communities of interest, especially in West Laramie. Before the council’s final vote Tuesday, he urged them to reread the letter Gonzales wrote.
“Think carefully about dividing our communities,” Halbsgut said. “There will be a lot of resentment on the west side and West Laramie … Whether you approve this proposition or 1B, you’re making a mistake.”
The council technically voted to postpone their final decision. The postponement allows city staff time to craft a final written description of map 1G, which the council will presumably approve on third and final reading next Tuesday. Their action at the meeting this week simply substituted map 1G for the former favorite 1B.