DeKalb County officials talk U.S. Census data delays, potential county redistricting issues

SYCAMORE – The delay in local governments receiving U.S. Census data for 2020 might throw a wrench in creating new district voting maps for DeKalb County, said county officials.

Sheila Santos, information technology director for DeKalb County, said during a County Board finance committee meeting on Wednesday there have been delays in U.S. Census data for 2020 being released. She said the census bureau officially announced the delayed release in the state’s redistricting data, which was originally supposed to happen next month.

“So that’s now scheduled to be by Sept. 30,” Santos said.

Santos said county officials have a general idea of where census blocks fall, since they have at least received 2020 geographical data from the bureau. However, she said, the county doesn’t have the more current population numbers to fill those blocks.

“And, of course, that’ll be the data that we need,” Santos said.

Santos said the county typically receives that data within the first few months of the year and then the county has plenty of time to prepare those redistricting maps.

“So this kind of puts a kink into that timeline,” Santos said.

Santos said the County Board normally would be adopting new county board districts by July, per state statute.

“That’s not going to be able to happen now,” Santos said.

Santos said she will keep close eye on what state does about the statute saying County Board districts have to be adopted explicitly by July, as opposed to days or weeks after counties receive the census data they need.

“So that poses a problem, because we won’t even have the data in order to redistrict by July,” Santos said.

The geographic census data at least gives the county an idea of where things fall and what changes might’ve occurred in the county since the 2010 census, Santos said. In the meantime, the county will train the three people drawing the maps – the county’s administrator, the community development coordinator and highway engineer – on the tools that were developed to create the maps while they wait for the remaining census data to come in.

“Because I think that we’ll be looking at a very tight timeline,” Santos said.

The County Board adopted a fair map ordinance a few years ago and that was added to county code, which set parameters that need to be met for redistricting. Some of the criteria that has to be met includes the county meeting a 3% quotient, a 5% ideal population and an 8% range variance.

“It’s a way to get them as close to ideal number as possible,” Santos said. “So it’s just three different ways of calculating just to try to strive for that.”

Santos said county officials took those parameters set in that ordinance and tested them using the 2010 maps. She ran the numbers on all six of the county’s contender maps and data that goes along with them and every single one failed to meet the criteria and therefore would not meet county code, she said.

“So that’s a little concerning,” Santos said. “And it’s difficult, because when you look at population of county and have 105,000 people, you have census blocks that might have 100 or 200 people in them and you shift them from one district to the other, all of the sudden, you cannot meet that criteria. That just becomes really difficult, and in order to strive to meet that, you might end up splitting up a subdivision or an area that … you would not want to split.”

County Board member Tim Bagby, who chairs the finance committee, agreed it’s something for the county to keep an eye on, along with municipal corporate boundaries and any annexations or de-annexations that have happened in the last decade.

“Because an apartment complex of any size could make a big difference of eligibility for certain … programs,” Bagby said.

Santos said she thinks the criteria outlined in the county code – which must be met currently, otherwise the maps can’t be adopted – could still be the goal in creating these new maps. She said she thinks the county might be in better shape if the code language is changed just slightly to strive to meet that goal but not make it a necessity to do so.

“The goal would be to still have a fair map and to meet that criteria as much as possible, but just to not restrict ourselves so much that we could end up in a position where we have no map to adopt,” Santos said.

“And then everybody runs countywide,” Bagby said.

Going forward, Santos said she will provide to the finance committee any updates she may receive about the census data coming through.

DeKalb County Board Chairman John Frieders said he plans to soon create a new ad hoc rules committee, which typically includes four Democratic members and four Republican members. He also said he asked Santos to also explain the situation to the full County Board during next week’s Committee of the Whole meeting.

“So everyone would be on the same page as to where we’re going with the situation with the redistricting,” Frieders said.