KINGWOOD — Preston County’s population is just barely large enough after the 2020 census that it will be represented by two delegates without taking population from another county after the state’s redistricting effort is complete.
Del. Terri Sypolt (R – Preston, 52), briefed the Preston County Commission on how the redistricting will affect the county at its regular meeting on Tuesday.
“And there is a map now available out there, as (Commission President Don Smith) said that does show that we are dividing the state into 100 delegate districts which will be single delegate districts,” Sypolt said “That bill was passed last session to do that. I believe that it will allow better representation than the multi-delegate districts.”
The biggest change, Sypolt said, is because of the population increase, Preston County will no longer drop down into Tucker County to take some voters, which she is sure they are happy about.
The goal with the redistricting is to try and divide Preston County into true northern and southern districts while not cutting straight through a municipality or community, Sypolt said. The first version presented to Sypolt looked nice with a straight line but cut parts of Alpine Lake and Terra Alta off and ran directly through Arthurdale.
“So I said, ‘Hey, that line needs to be smoothed down a little bit.’ So even though it maybe is a little bit more of a curve, we kind of went up a little bit higher,” she said. “And we got all Alpine Lake to go out, ’cause I felt Alpine needed to be with Terra Alta. At least, it didn’t need to be cut in two, and definitely Arthurdale didn’t need to be cut in two.”
The northern part of the county, thanks to Hazelton Prison, Masontown, and the Valley District area, had a greater population increase than the southern section, Sypolt said.
“So those three areas have pushed Kingwood into southern,” she said. “So that’s never really happened before. Kingwood’s always been in your northern. So it looks as though Kingwood will be in the southern area.”
Sypolt said she had one meeting about the map and didn’t get to see another version until they were released to the public, at which point she was able to look at the lines with Google Earth to see individual houses.
“I believe we need to work on it again and really critique it,” Sypolt said.
Commissioner Dave Price asked if she thinks she would get that opportunity and Sypolt told him she would fight for it.
Sypolt said she believes the proposed line cuts too much into the White Oaks area, Freeland Road area and Gladesville areas. However, moving the line isn’t as simple as just doing it — change needs to happen in the context of entire census blocks.
“But what is our situation, we’re so close in population, if we move this line just to take in 10 or 20 houses here, we’ve got to go over here and ship 10 or 20 here because we’re so close,” Sypolt said.
At this point, Sypolt will need to go through a committee member to change the line via an amendment, she said. After that, any change will require an amendment on the floor, which is even more difficult.
“If we don’t get it done by the next stage, the next stage is more difficult. So it needs to be done. And they’re wanting everything done by Sunday. And this is Tuesday,” Sypolt said.
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