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[music]

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Elizabeth Gerber: Good evening, and welcome to 
Policy Talks at the Ford School of Public Policy

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at the University of Michigan. I'm Elizabeth 
Gerber, I'm a professor at the Ford School.

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I'm also the director of the program in practical 
policy engagement, as well as a faculty affiliate

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at the Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy, 
two of the co-sponsors of this evening's event.

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This is the third webinar in a series of 
four sponsored by the Center for Local,

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State, and Urban Policy, Voters not Politicians,

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and Michigan State University's Institute 
for Public Policy and Social Research.

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EG: The purpose of these webinars 
is to educate and engage the public

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in Michigan's redistricting process. I'd like 
to thank all of the organizers and co-sponsors,

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including the Gerald R. Ford School of Public 
Policy, Bridge Magazine, The League of Women

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Voters of Michigan, the University of Michigan's 
Program and Practical Policy Engagement,

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and Detroit Public Television. Special thanks 
as well to Connie Cook and Charlie Beall from

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Voters Not Politicians for coordinating 
this great group of presenters today.

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EG: Tonight's event will bring us up to speed 
on what has happened so far with Michigan's new

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approach to redistricting, and to focus on how 
stakeholders can best represent their interests

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in the final stages of the process as the 
commission prepares to receive the second

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and final round of public input. I hope you 
enjoy this evening's event. And now, it is

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my distinct honor to introduce our moderator, 
Sergio Martinez-Beltran of Bridge Magazine.

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Sergio Martinez-Beltran: Thank you so 
much, Liz, and good evening, everyone.

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My name is Sergio Martinez-Beltran, and I'm a 
reporter with Bridge Michigan, and you saw a

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minute ago my dog, his name is Mambru. I cover 
state government and politics, but lately,

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I've been focusing on the redistricting process 
in the state. I have been able to follow the

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commission as they travel around the state, 
gathering input from Michigan residents, and I,

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along with other reporters from across the state, 
have reported on the commission's progress,

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its mishaps, and everything in between. So 
I'm excited to moderate this panel and I

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hope you all leave tonight with more clarity 
of what the redistricting commission is doing

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and with a better idea on how to participate 
in the process. At the end of the day,

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it was Michigan voters who supported a 
constitutional amendment that changed the

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way the state does redistricting, so, it's 
super important that you are all involved.

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SM: Before we hear from our panelists today, 
let's briefly talk about the format we're

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following this evening. We'll begin the 
night with Sue Hammersmith, the executive

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director of the Michigan Independent Citizens 
Redistricting Commission. She'll speak about

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where the commission is in the mapping process and 
what to expect from them in the next few weeks.

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SM: Then Dr. Moon Duchin will talk about 
the online portal used by the commission

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for public input. Bob Chunn will follow and talk 
about his work with two communities of interest,

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the midline community and the LGBT community 
in the Detroit area. And then Dr. Hayg Oshagan

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will close the presentations by talking about 
how he's helped communities that share ethnic

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and racial similarities come forward and 
participate in the redistricting process.

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And then we want to hear from you tonight. We will 
have about 30 minutes for questions at the end.

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Some of you audience members already submitted 
questions when you registered for this panel,

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but you can also submit questions on YouTube 
and on Facebook, and if you're using Twitter,

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don't forget to use the hashtag policy 
talks. And just so you know, folks from

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Voters not Politicians will be answering some 
questions directly in their live YouTube chat.

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SM: Alright, so, let's start. First 
speaking tonight is Sue Hammersmith.

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She is the executive director for the Michigan 
Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.

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In her role, she facilitates and executes the work 
of the commission to ensure fair and independent

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maps for Michigan congressional house and 
senate districts. Sue brings more than 30 years

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of executive experience in non-profits. She's 
nationally certified as a faculty trainer for The

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Association of Fundraising Professionals, and as a 
non-profit board consultant through Board Source.

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So, thanks so much for joining 
us tonight, Sue. Take it away.

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Sue Hammersmith: Thank you so much, Sergio. 
I'm so delighted to be here this evening,

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and we so appreciate the sponsors who are helping 
the Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting

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Commission to get the word out and let citizens 
know how they can have a voice in this process.

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Next slide, please.

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SH: So the commissioners are 13 randomly selected 
citizens from over 9000 applications. These are

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the pictures of each of the commissioners, and 
they include four Democrats, four Republicans,

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and five who don't affiliate with 
either major party in Michigan.

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This group has the exclusive authority 
in the State of Michigan to draw the maps

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for the Michigan congressional and 
state house and state senate districts.

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SH: What is redistricting? Redistricting is a 
process that happens every 10 years following

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census. The district lines have to be redrawn due 
to population changes. The process of drawing the

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lines is redistricting, and in Michigan, there 
will be 161 districts drawn for the 2022 election

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cycle. Why should you care about redistricting? 
Well, first, openness and transparency,

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and as well as public engagement, represent the 
principles of this new redistricting process.

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Now you have an opportunity to ensure your 
voice and your community's voice is heard.

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Instead of politicians choosing their districts to 
best represent their interests, Michigan residents

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can share their interests to assist in the 
development of the districts through the

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Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting 
Commission, or as we say for short, MICRC.

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SH: So here's the breakdown of the 
districts that will be drawn. Currently,

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Michigan's population according to the 2020 census 
is 10,077,331 people. The 161 districts include

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the 13 Michigan congressional districts. These 
have an average of 775,200 people per district.

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There are 38 Michigan senate districts, 
an average of 265,200 people per district,

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and there are 110 Michigan house districts 
with an average of 91,600 people per district.

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SH: The redistricting criteria are stated very 
clearly in the constitutional amendment that

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was approved by the Michigan voters in 2018. These 
are listed in rank order, so the first is the most

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important down to the lesser important. So 
first, districts must be of equal population and

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comply with the Voting Rights Act. The 
Voting Rights Act is federal legislation

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that requires equal population, and it also 
prohibits minority or language discrimination.

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SH: Secondly, districts have to be geographically 
contiguous. The lines have to be touching; they

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can't be random islands connected together. Third, 
districts need to reflect our state's diversity

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and communities of interest. The Constitution 
also defines communities of interest as

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groups that share cultural or historical 
characteristics or economic interest,

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but it also states we're not limited to those 
specific descriptions. Fourth and fifth apply to

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political parties or candidates. There can't be a 
disproportionate advantage to any political party,

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and the maps cannot favor or disfavor an incumbent 
elected official or a candidate for office. Sixth,

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maps must reflect consideration of county, city, 
and township boundaries. And lastly, they must be

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reasonably compact. It's a pretty tall order, 
but the commissioners are up to the challenge.

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SH: So before the first line was drawn, 
the Constitution required that Michigan

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hold 10 public hearings. Our commissioners 
are overachievers, I like to say. They held

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16 public hearings throughout the state, and they 
accepted public comments before any lines were

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drawn on the maps. It's not too late to share 
your public comments, we're still looking for

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comments from the public as the maps are drafted 
and proposed maps will be put forth before the

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second round of public hearings. We also have a 
public comment portal. You may go there and you

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may put in a map, you may draw a map and upload a 
map. You may put in comments on a map that exists.

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You may put in comments about your community of 
interest, or you may share any comments that you

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have about the redistricting process. Our website 
is michigan.gov/MICRC. We love to hear the public

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comments, and it's been very interesting watching 
all the public comments come in. It's been great.

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SH: A little bit about the mapping process.

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Again, the commission is drafting maps for the 
13 Michigan congressional 110 house and 38 senate

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districts. The commissioners consider public 
comments, including communities of interest,

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and are engaging in deliberations to determine 
which draft proposed maps will be presented for

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input during the upcoming second round of public 
hearings. The goals of the second round of public

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hearings, and again, these are listed in the 
Michigan Constitution, are, one: To solicit public

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comments regarding the proposed districts; two: 
Each proposed district shall include the census

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data, map, and legal description; and third, 
the Constitution requires five public hearings,

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but our commission has elected to do nine. Again, 
they're overachievers, they want to hear from you.

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SH: So locations for the second round 
of public hearings include Monday,

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October 11th in Flint at the Dort Center; Tuesday, 
October 12th, at Treetop Resorts in Gaylord;

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Thursday, October 14th, at Northern Michigan 
University in Marquette. During the next week,

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we'll go to Grand Rapids and we'll be at the 
Amway Grand Plaza Hotel on Monday, October 18th.

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The following day, we will be in Kalamazoo at 
the Radisson Plaza Hotel in Kalamazoo Center,

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and then on Thursday of that week, October 
21st, we'll be at the Lansing Center in

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Lansing. And then the last week of public 
hearings includes Monday, October 25th,

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at Macomb Community College in Warren; on Tuesday, 
October 26th, we just had a location change.

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We'll be at the Sheraton Detroit Novi in Novi. 
And on Thursday, October 28th, we'll be at the

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TCF Center in Detroit. We hope that you'll come 
out and join us and give your public comment.

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SH: So a little bit about adopting the maps. 
After the public hearings, there will be more

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deliberations by the commission to develop 
proposed maps. There will be public notice

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of each plan that will be voted on, and then there 
will be an additional 45 days for public comment.

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A vote to adopt maps requires a majority vote 
that includes two members who affiliate with

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the Democrat Party, two Republicans, and two 
who are independents or affiliate with neither

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party. After that, the adopted maps will be 
published, and all the supporting material and

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data will also be published within 30 days, and 
the maps become law 60 days after publication.

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SH: So what would we like from you? We would like 
you to show up and speak up. You can learn more

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information by signing up for email or text 
alerts on the website, michigan.gov/MICRC.

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If you want to see the proposed draft maps 
that the commissioners are working on,

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you can also go to the website, and there's a 
proposed draft map button right at the top of

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the website where you can view and comment on 
any plan that has been drawn by the commission.

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SH: You can also mail comments to PO Box 30318 
in Lansing, Michigan. If you need additional

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information, directions about a public hearing, 
times, additional details that you don't see on

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the website readily, call 1-833-You-Draw, 
that's 1-833-968-3729 for information

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or to learn how you can provide public comments 
at a regular meeting or at a public hearing.

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You can also like the commission on Facebook, 
follow them on Instagram or Twitter, subscribe to

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the YouTube channel. All meetings are on YouTube, 
you can watch the meetings live, you can watch

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recordings of all meetings and public hearings, 
you can submit your comments on the website and

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attend any meeting or public hearing. We invite 
you to participate in Michigan's new redistricting

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process. This is a historical opportunity 
to be on the ground level of the very first

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time there's been citizen input here in Michigan. 
Please, please give us your comments. Thank you.

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SM: Thank you so much, Sue, for sharing 
that. Up next is Dr. Moon Duchin.

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Moon is a mathematician at Tufts University who 
runs the MGGG Redistricting Lab as part of the

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Tisch College of Civic Life. Her research 
group has specialists in math, computation,

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law, geography, and public outreach, and they have 
developed a Districtr software package for drawing

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districts and communities of interest. Their 
redistricting lab will be working in eight states

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in 2021 to assist commissions, legislatures, 
and parallel public processes with public infant

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collection and map evaluation. Duchin's work on 
the geometry of redistricting has been recognized

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by the Guggenheim Foundation and the Radcliffe 
Institute for Advanced Study. Recently, one

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area of research focus is the use of computing to 
enable districting that better comports with the

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aims of the Voting Rights Act. I'm excited you're 
a part of this panel, Moon. The floor is yours.

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Dr. Moon Duchin: Okay. Thank you so much. Can you 
see my slide, and does it show in full screen?

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SM: Yes, we can.

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DD: Alright, great. So I'll just... I'll be brief. 
Let me take a moment to say a little bit about the

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way we got involved and the kind of projects that 
we have in Michigan, and I'll take you a little

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bit through the process of COI collection and 
aggregation, and then kick it to the next speaker.

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So first of all, we're a lab at the Tisch 
College of Civic Life, as you have heard.

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The MGGG stands for Metric Geometry and 
Gerrymandering Group, it started out as just

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a working group of mathematicians trying to think 
about democracy fixes and became a lab over the

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years, and now do a lot of work in both technology 
to promote democratic best practices and

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in some math and computation behind the scenes. 
And I think this project is a really excellent

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example of our mission, we've been really excited 
to be able to be part of this historic process.

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And so, we were brought in by MDOS, the Michigan 
Department of State, to assist with the collection

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and the aggregation of public input. Let me talk a 
little bit about what that looks like in Michigan.

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DD: Okay, so, what we set up, and what I hope 
folks listening have already checked out,

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and if not, please do, is a public 
submission portal called michiganmapping.org,

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and what that is, it's a way to take 
public feedback that talks to our free

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public mapping software called Districtr. So, this 
is a screenshot from districtr.org that shows you

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an example, I'm gonna pull this off the portal, of 
someone who's drawing districts in Michigan, and

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we made this Michigan mapping portal talk 
to Districtr so that you could upload

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your comments in the form of districts or 
in the form of a community of interest.

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DD: I was particularly interested in using 
technology to better access public mapping data,

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because looking hard... The idea that 
communities matter in redistricting

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is a really old one. It has a long 
pedigree in American democracy.

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It's kind of one of the founding 
justifications for drawing districts at all,

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is that when you draw geographical districts, 
you can capture local interests, and so you need

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to sort of know what those are in order to do the 
best job of drawing districts. So, Michigan is far

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from alone in having communities of interest 
in its rules and priorities and criteria.

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DD: But the problem historically has been one of 
translating from people's ideas of community to

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something visible and actionable that can help 
guide your decisions when you're drawing the

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lines. So, we were really excited to sort of make 
a technological intervention there. We tried to

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make a really user-friendly mechanism for taking 
what you have to say about where you live and what

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makes it special, shared interests, animate that 
community. We wanted people to be able to attach

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that to a map, to turn it into the kind of data 
that you can view while drawing boundary lines.

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DD: Okay, so let's take a walk-through. Well, 
first, let me say a little bit about what we

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collect. So you can draw a complete plan at any 
of the levels of districting: Congressional,

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state senate, state house, or you can just draw 
your community. In the community mode, you can

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draw overlapping communities and you can narrate 
what about them makes them distinctive. But then

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the portal has a feedback form that you fill out 
where you give your name, contact information,

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and more context about your submission. All of 
this is then stored in a secure database, which we

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are committed to making publicly available and to 
putting it in whatever form people need the data

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in that we can wrangle. So that's a bit about how 
the process works. I should emphasize that folks

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can draw in Districtr in all, as I like to say, 
52 states. We have the official states plus Puerto

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Rico and DC available for drawing. And you can 
generate URLs, you can share them on social media,

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so Districtr has already been around for a few 
years, but the portal is a way to make a little

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bit of a more official declarative statement 
about what you are trying to tell the MICRC.

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DD: Okay, so, this went extraordinarily well. 
[chuckle] So after we launched the portal, we sort

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of sat and waited anxiously, the Michigan one was 
the first one that we launched, we now have them

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in several states, we sat and waited anxiously to 
see if submissions would in fact come in, and they

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came in, they came pouring in, which I think is 
a testament to the good work of the commission,

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to the good work of the Department of State, 
and to group like Voters Not Politicians,

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who really just tapped wide interest among 
Michiganders in giving this kind of feedback.

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So, that's fantastic that we got submissions, 
but then that raises the question, what do you

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do with them? So, by the end of August, there were 
1225 areas mapped in the portal. That's great, but

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then you have to figure out how to synthesize all 
of that information into something that's usable,

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because over 1200 areas is probably too many 
to think about or try to vet individually.

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DD: So, I'll talk through the littlest bit about 
the data science process that we use to cluster

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these. So the first thing we did was try to 
measure overlaps, so if you have two different

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areas, you want something quantitative that tells 
you that these two areas are not quite as close

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as these two areas are. And so this is 
where you get to tap your mathematics,

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and we used something, we experimented with 
different notions of how close two areas are,

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and settled on something called house door 
assistance, and we used that to take all

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those 1225 areas and look at them two at a 
time and ask how close or how far are they.

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DD: So using all those pairwise distances, 
that's how we distilled 36 geographical clusters.

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To this, I often get the question like, "Why 36? 
Why didn't you make 50 clusters or 20 clusters?",

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and the answer is that once you 
have all those distances worked out,

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you can cluster it as finely or coarsely as you 
want. So we experimented with different scales

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of clustering in order to produce the 
most usable product for the commission,

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and we felt good about the 36, but the 
raw data, as I'll link to at the end,

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is available for everyone, so I hope everyone on 
this webinar will try your hands at this as well.

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DD: Then we had teams of students classify 
the submissions. So we read through all the

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submissions and all the texts that came with them 
and classified them with labels like agriculture,

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vulnerable populations, economy and 
commerce, and several dozen of these

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labels. The way we used those labels 
was, within a geographical cluster,

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we used a sorting technique to try to find 
thematically similar pieces within a cluster.

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DD: Okay, so that's just a little bit about 
the process, but here's what it does for you.

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We have a final report set up for this, you 
can see it at the link at the top of this slide

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MGGG.org/publications/MichiganCOI.pdf. So here's 
just an example of a cluster we ended up calling

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C-14. We had an A phase of clusters, and then a 
B phase, and C is the final phase. So this is the

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Grand Rapids metro area, and it's supported by 
55 submissions. And then what we do is we show

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these heat maps that illustrate where the clusters 
are, and then give a little blurb or summary of

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the major themes in the cluster. And then you can 
see, we took this Grand Rapids cluster 'cause it

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was fairly large, with 55 submissions, and we 
sub-sorted it into C-14 one and C-14 two. One

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of them was more about infrastructure 
concerns, talking about city schools;

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the other one was more suburban themes. But you 
don't have to take our word for it, because the

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report contains all the supporting data. So by 
clicking on where it says 55 submissions, you

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jump in the report to a table that shows you just 
all the raw, from the horse's mouth information

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that we distilled to make the clusters. 
So again, fully transparent, fully public,

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try it yourself. I think you'll probably come 
up with similar clusters, because the data did

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actually sort itself out fairly well. Okay, 
so that's what you can find in the report.

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DD: So, let's sort of zoom out and ask 
the question, "What do you do with this

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sort of a user guide, how can this help us 
draw better districts?" Well, first of all,

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what does this represent? So, the submissions to 
the portal are a bottom-up look at the communities

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and lived experiences of folks from all over 
Michigan. In the past, people have either given

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00:26:10,000 --> 00:26:15,200
post-hoc descriptions of the community structure 
of their districts. They'll draw the districts

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first and then say after the fact, "Oh, this one 
has the coal industry in common." So you could

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sometimes do a good job that way, but this is 
actually, right from the beginning, taking the

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00:26:30,320 --> 00:26:35,120
feedback of individuals and knitting something 
together from individual feedback upfront before

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00:26:35,120 --> 00:26:42,480
you draw the lines. So it's a bottom-up look at 
the communities and lived experiences. But these

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00:26:42,480 --> 00:26:48,480
1225 areas completely cover the state, and of 
course, redistricting is about drawing lines, so

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you're going to have to cut something somewhere. 
Districting is all about making choices.

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00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:59,840
So since you have to split some of them, the 
clusters we hope can help you the public and can

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help the commission think about when and where to 
cut and how to amplify the voices of communities.

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DD: Let me just underscore that for a moment, 
because most people, when they first start

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thinking about how to use communities to draw 
better districts, they have the intuition that

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if you wanna amplify the voice of a community, you 
should keep it whole, don't cut it, don't split

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that community. But sometimes a community is very 
large, if it's almost the size of the district.

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Then if you don't split it, you'll be actually 
packing that district with a single kind of

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shared interest and thereby arguably diluting 
the vote. So sometimes it is strategic to take a

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relatively large cluster and divide it. But having 
the clusters and being able to access their themes

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00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:45,840
can really help you make informed decisions 
about when and where to cut. And I know that

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00:27:45,840 --> 00:27:50,800
as the commission has done its work so far, 
they've often referred back to those individual

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submissions from the public. They sort of flipped 
back and forth between their map and what people

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00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:59,840
have to say about it, and it's helped them 
make some calls about where to draw the lines.

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DD: Okay, and so that's about where I'll leave 
it. I'll just say there are two things that are

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about to come to michigan-mapping.org as 
the commission produces its first round of

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00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:17,680
plans that are ready for public comment. We'll 
have those plans hosted on michigan-mapping.org to

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make it easy for the public to view them, to give 
feedback on them and to modify them, if they want.

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The other thing that's about to appear 
on michigan-mapping.org is COI overlays,

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so you'll be able to see the districting plan and 
these areas, these clusters that I showed you,

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layed on top so you can see exactly how the 
district lines interact with the clusters.

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DD: Alright, I've said a lot, so I'll leave 
it there. I'll close with some handy links:

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MGGG.org that you can find out more about our lab; 
michigan-mapping.org, that's the public portal.

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It interacts with Districtr. I already gave the 
address at which you can find our final report,

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Michigan COI PDF. And then finally, MDOS, the 
Department of State, is setting up a secure

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server that will host all the raw materials, 
and that's not yet set up, so in the interim, I

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00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:15,840
created this tiny URL link so that you don't 
have to wait, if you wanna see all the raw data,

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00:29:15,840 --> 00:29:20,080
all the CSVs and all those sheet files and all 
the JSONs, if you wanna see everything that went

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00:29:20,080 --> 00:29:25,760
into this, I think transparency is key. So 
here's an address where you can go and find

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all those raw materials. Alright, I'll stop there 
and eventually look forward to your questions.

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SM: Wonderful, thank you, Moon. And I think the 
Districtr is like a game-changer, at least. I've

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spent a lot of nights trying to draw 
districts, and I think if everyone

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00:29:44,240 --> 00:29:47,440
has the opportunity to actually go to 
that website and try to draw the maps,

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00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:51,920
you guys are gonna have a better understanding 
of how complicated it is to draw districts and

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how multi-layered it is, which I think it's 
something that we have to keep in mind.

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00:29:57,760 --> 00:30:04,160
SM: Alright, so our next speaker is Bob Chunn of 
Next Vote. Chunn is the president and co-founder

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00:30:04,160 --> 00:30:09,920
of RelA2ve, which is a Michigan-based technology 
company serving non-profits, foundations,

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00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:16,160
and political organizations with technology 
designed to engage and activate specific audiences

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00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:21,840
for public policy and voting issues. We appreciate 
you joining us this evening, Bob. Take it away.

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[pause]

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SM:

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00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:35,360
Bob, you're muted. [chuckle] If you had...

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00:30:35,360 --> 00:30:41,280
Bob Chunn: I knew... I should have know I'd be 
the one to do that. [chuckle] Thank you, Sergio.

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00:30:41,280 --> 00:30:48,320
So it's a pleasure to be here and to be talking 
about our work with communities of interest and

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00:30:49,040 --> 00:30:57,520
the redistricting process in Michigan. So, we're 
a relatively new company. We were formed just last

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00:30:57,520 --> 00:31:06,400
year, and we worked a lot during the election to 
get out the vote, and we specifically designed

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00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:13,680
technology and found gaps where technology 
was a barrier for the public to get involved.

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00:31:14,480 --> 00:31:21,600
And that communication technology led us to 
redistricting, and we saw some gaps here, too.

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00:31:22,560 --> 00:31:29,920
BC: So, Next Vote was formed at RelA2ve, and 
we've been working on redistricting all year.

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00:31:31,120 --> 00:31:36,720
So some of the things that we've done are to 
make our own version of mapping districting and

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00:31:36,720 --> 00:31:44,640
community of interest software, but we operate it, 
and we operate it on behalf of non-profits around

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00:31:44,640 --> 00:31:55,840
the state, some 60 of them. And if you go to 
nextvote.us, you'll see our analysis of every map

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00:31:56,560 --> 00:32:02,560
that has been submitted to the public portal up 
until the end of August, and we're working on the

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00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:12,560
newest ones, and we've created our own versions 
of the MICRC's maps, where you can go look at.

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00:32:12,560 --> 00:32:20,320
And these are Districtr-based maps, so you can 
go from our nextvote.us software over the Moon's

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00:32:21,520 --> 00:32:25,720
districtr.org and see the 
maps in both of those places.

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00:32:25,720 --> 00:32:35,040
BC: So, one of the things that becomes part 
of our work as we analyze maps and we look for

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00:32:35,040 --> 00:32:42,880
these criteria that Moon and Sue were talking 
about, we look for compliance to those things

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00:32:42,880 --> 00:32:50,400
and specifically to communities of interest. 
So, I thought I'd tell a story of a couple

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00:32:50,960 --> 00:32:58,720
of communities of interest that we have 
worked with this year. So, LGBT Detroit,

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00:32:58,720 --> 00:33:07,760
which is based in Palmer Park, that's their 
community, and what we do for them is to sit with

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00:33:07,760 --> 00:33:16,320
them, we hear their story about the fact that 
they are an LGBTQ community and they are also

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00:33:17,280 --> 00:33:28,400
minorities and mostly Black, and they suffer from 
a whole suite of issues related to gentrification

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00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:33,680
and people taking over their community in Detroit, 
and they really wanna be able to vote together.

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00:33:34,720 --> 00:33:38,800
So this is important to them, 
and the problem that they have is

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00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:47,120
of communicating to the Redistricting 
Commission where they are and what they're

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00:33:47,120 --> 00:33:50,960
about and why it's important that they 
get to stay together and vote together.

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00:33:50,960 --> 00:34:00,320
BC: And so, we sat down with Geron Troton, who's 
a good friend at LGBT Detroit and we help him to

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00:34:00,320 --> 00:34:05,840
draw his map. And we actually used our software 
at Next Vote to do it over a Zoom session,

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00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:13,840
and then we helped to coalesce their story 
to tell the narrative of LGBT Detroit,

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00:34:13,840 --> 00:34:20,560
and if you look on the public portal, it's 
called Palmer Park 2.0. We help to tell

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00:34:20,560 --> 00:34:25,920
their story, and then we go out and we use our 
communication tools to gather support for them.

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00:34:26,480 --> 00:34:36,400
So you'd find that LGBT Detroit has the most 
comments of any community of interest or map

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00:34:36,960 --> 00:34:45,120
on michigan-mapping.org, which is the place where 
everybody is talking about redistricting, that's

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00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:55,000
the MICRC's and Moon's work to make it easy for 
us all to communicate what our communities need.

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00:34:55,000 --> 00:35:03,120
BC: And the second community of interest that 
I wanna bring up is around the tri-city area,

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00:35:03,120 --> 00:35:09,520
and this was some of our earliest work, working 
with many different groups who felt that

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00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:16,880
the tri-city area ought to stay together and vote 
together. They suffered environmental issues with

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00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:22,240
the Edenville Dam collapse, which we learned a lot 
about, that affected Midland but it also affected

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00:35:24,640 --> 00:35:32,240
the communities to the south. And in that 
area of Midland, Saginaw, and Bay City,

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00:35:33,920 --> 00:35:41,600
they used to call it the tri-city airport that 
was one of the few international airports in our

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00:35:41,600 --> 00:35:47,440
state. Now, it's named something else because 
that community no longer votes together.

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00:35:48,240 --> 00:35:53,440
And so, we help them to make 
arguments, many different groups,

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00:35:54,000 --> 00:35:59,920
that the tri-city area was not just a 
district but it was a community of interest

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00:36:00,560 --> 00:36:06,240
who all work together. They go to school 
together at two great state universities,

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00:36:06,240 --> 00:36:11,840
they have environmental concerns that they 
share and economic concerns that they share.

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00:36:12,560 --> 00:36:17,520
And the way that it works out, and 
there's cases that most of the time,

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00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:25,840
the maps that the MICRC are producing have 
kept those two community of interest whole.

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00:36:25,840 --> 00:36:34,240
BC: So our work extends beyond just creating the 
maps. We're watching every map that gets produced,

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00:36:35,680 --> 00:36:42,960
and we're offering alternatives of 
district maps that do better at keeping

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00:36:43,520 --> 00:36:48,800
communities of interest together and 
that are fairer maps. So I hope you'll

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00:36:48,800 --> 00:36:55,840
visit nextvote.us and see what we're doing 
there, and I'll turn it back to you, Sergio.

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00:36:56,760 --> 00:37:04,480
SH: Thank you, Bob, I appreciate it. Alright, 
so our last speaker is Dr. Hayg Oshagan,

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00:37:04,480 --> 00:37:10,880
but before I introduce him, I wanna remind people 
to post your questions and submit them on Facebook

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00:37:10,880 --> 00:37:16,160
or YouTube and you can also use the hashtag 
policy talks on Twitter to submit your question.

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00:37:16,800 --> 00:37:23,520
Alright, so, Hayg does a lot of things. He is 
a professor at Wayne State University and the

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00:37:23,520 --> 00:37:29,440
founder and executive director of New Michigan 
Media, that's the network of ethnic and minority

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00:37:29,440 --> 00:37:35,600
media in Michigan. New Michigan Media includes 
the publishers of the largest African-American,

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00:37:35,600 --> 00:37:42,640
Arab, Jewish, Latino, and Asian newspapers in the 
Detroit Metro area, and it is also connected with

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00:37:42,640 --> 00:37:49,040
over 140 minority media across the state. 
His most recent efforts include assisting

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00:37:49,040 --> 00:37:54,480
the State of Michigan on their 2020 census to 
reach minority communities across the state,

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00:37:54,480 --> 00:38:00,960
getting information out to minority communities on 
the COVID-19 relief and the PPP and the vaccine,

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00:38:00,960 --> 00:38:06,240
and helping the Michigan Independent Citizens 
Redistricting Commission, Voters Not Politicians,

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00:38:06,240 --> 00:38:12,080
and the Michigan Nonprofit Association with 
regional and statewide redistricting efforts.

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00:38:12,080 --> 00:38:15,760
Thank you, Hayg, for joining us tonight and 
we're excited to hear what you have to share.

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00:38:15,760 --> 00:38:22,640
Dr. Hayg Oshagan: Thank you Sergio. Yes, my slide 
show's there. Thank you, thank you again for the

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00:38:22,640 --> 00:38:30,880
organizers as well for the invitation. So my 
concern, as made apparent by the intro, has been

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00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:37,840
minorities, ethnic and racial. And so I approach 
the redistricting issue from that perspective,

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00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:45,280
in terms of community of interests, but in this 
case, specifically ethnic and minority communities

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00:38:45,280 --> 00:38:52,400
of interest. And the approach is actually also 
from a perspective of the media and the role

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00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:58,880
that the media can play in redistricting. This is 
the map of our state, and the darker areas are the

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00:38:58,880 --> 00:39:07,280
concentrations of minorities in Michigan. And you 
can see that by the 2020 census, 27% of the state

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00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:13,440
is comprised of ethnic and racial minorities, and 
this is likely an under count because a number

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00:39:13,440 --> 00:39:21,120
of them don't show up unless people fill in the 
census in particular with their ethnicity or race.

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00:39:21,120 --> 00:39:26,960
DO: New Michigan Media as Sergio mentioned, 
is a collaboration. It's a collaboration of

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00:39:26,960 --> 00:39:32,400
the largest minority papers in the southeast 
Michigan, and also a connection with the broad,

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00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:38,960
vast array of ethnic and minority media across the 
rest of the state. The importance here with media,

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00:39:38,960 --> 00:39:46,560
especially in these sorts of efforts, is that 
these media constitute trusted voices in their

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00:39:46,560 --> 00:39:51,440
communities. They are often leaders in their 
communities, the publishers of these papers

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00:39:51,440 --> 00:39:56,800
are active leaders in their communities. The 
publisher of the Arabic paper in Detroit, for

369
00:39:56,800 --> 00:40:02,960
example, is a kin to a mayor of that community. 
They are advocacy voices of their communities,

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00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:08,560
they are trusted by their community members, 
and so, what they say carries a great deal of

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00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:16,560
weight. What they pursue or promote often goes 
much further than what an official might say,

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00:40:16,560 --> 00:40:24,000
a governor or a mayor might say. And so the use 
of these resources in advancing initiatives,

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00:40:24,000 --> 00:40:29,120
like the census and like redistricting, 
is important for these in particular,

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00:40:29,120 --> 00:40:33,040
the ethnic communities, across the 
state. And so that's been my engagement.

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00:40:33,040 --> 00:40:37,840
DO: The experience I gained in this, in 
particular was with the census itself.

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00:40:38,880 --> 00:40:43,280
MNA and the State of Michigan, Michigan 
Nonprofit Association and the State of Michigan,

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00:40:43,280 --> 00:40:49,200
came to us as the Detroit, the city in 
Wayne County, to work on the census and help

378
00:40:50,640 --> 00:40:55,280
promote participation across the state from 
down here, all the way up to Marquette with

379
00:40:55,280 --> 00:41:00,560
Native American tribes. And the conversations 
I had with tribal leaders, with publishers,

380
00:41:00,560 --> 00:41:06,000
editors across the state, which I organized to 
understand better the lay of the land, as it were,

381
00:41:06,000 --> 00:41:13,040
really helped inform what are the challenges and 
how to understand information and action in the

382
00:41:13,040 --> 00:41:19,840
context of these communities. In fact, as also 
was mentioned, we helped in the formation of the

383
00:41:19,840 --> 00:41:26,400
commission itself. At the beginning, well, a month 
ago before the application process was to close

384
00:41:27,920 --> 00:41:32,480
across the state, 67,000 people had applied, 
but there were only 50 Latinos, for example,

385
00:41:32,480 --> 00:41:38,480
who had applied. Michigan Department of 
State came to us and said, "Can you help?"

386
00:41:38,480 --> 00:41:42,960
And so we organized campaigns in the Bengali, 
in the Arab, in the Latino communities to help

387
00:41:43,760 --> 00:41:47,840
minorities apply to even be considered 
to be selected for the commission.

388
00:41:47,840 --> 00:41:56,800
DO: The statewide plan for 
redistricting was put together after

389
00:41:57,600 --> 00:42:04,640
the commission itself, Michigan Nonprofit 
Association, Voters Not Politicians, asked us

390
00:42:04,640 --> 00:42:13,120
to be involved in the process, in particular, 
MNA and MICRC. We adopted the census approach

391
00:42:13,120 --> 00:42:19,360
to doing this work. Oops, the other way. 
It's a vast state, and so you need to begin

392
00:42:19,360 --> 00:42:24,960
by focusing on where minorities live. And for 
redistricting, the focus became, for this effort,

393
00:42:24,960 --> 00:42:29,440
Detroit, Flint, Grand Rapids, Lansing, Jackson, 
Marquette, Traverse City, and Benton Harbor.

394
00:42:29,440 --> 00:42:34,160
The populations that we targeted as well for 
the redistricting process were Black, Arab,

395
00:42:34,160 --> 00:42:39,280
Yemeni, and Sinsleada Yemeni because it's a 
very distinct community in the Detroit area.

396
00:42:39,280 --> 00:42:43,840
Chaldean, Asian, Indian, Bangladeshi, Korean, 
Caribbean, Hispanic, and Native American.

397
00:42:43,840 --> 00:42:50,320
DO: The second issue of course, then is to figure 
out the messaging. It's not a simple thing to just

398
00:42:50,320 --> 00:42:55,360
say, "You need to participate in redistricting." 
First, the language issues has to be considered,

399
00:42:55,360 --> 00:43:00,480
but most importantly, the relevance has to be 
taken into account, why should anyone participate

400
00:43:00,480 --> 00:43:05,040
in redistricting? What would it make... What 
difference would it make to them? This was

401
00:43:05,040 --> 00:43:09,440
seriously also the case with the census, this 
is one of the lessons that we learned, that

402
00:43:09,440 --> 00:43:13,520
it's not enough to just put a message out there 
and assume people will understand its relevance.

403
00:43:13,520 --> 00:43:20,480
It's important to actually really explain, parse 
out the relevance of a project for someone to take

404
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:29,120
time and work at. And then the outreach plan 
itself. Newspapers, radio, online, Facebook

405
00:43:29,120 --> 00:43:36,720
groups, we access about 40 plus of these different 
outlets, advertising editorials, digital content,

406
00:43:36,720 --> 00:43:41,840
meetings, email, texts and then finally, I'll talk 
about this in a bit, organizing events as well.

407
00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:45,520
DO: The challenge... I keep going to 
the wrong direction. The challenge with

408
00:43:47,040 --> 00:43:52,240
redistricting starts with the census itself. 
This is the question in the census for race.

409
00:43:53,040 --> 00:43:58,480
And what's missing here, for example, in 
particular for my case in southeast Detroit,

410
00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:05,360
is that there is no Arab category. There's 
no Middle Eastern and North African MENA

411
00:44:05,360 --> 00:44:10,240
category that the census rejected. And so 
someone would have to write, then, Arab,

412
00:44:10,240 --> 00:44:16,320
or Lebanese, or Yemeni, for it appear, and we know 
people don't do that very often. The second thing

413
00:44:16,320 --> 00:44:22,240
that's missing from this is Bangladeshi. You have 
the Asian categories there, Chinese, Filipino,

414
00:44:22,240 --> 00:44:28,000
Indian, Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese, Samoan, 
Chamorro, and Native Hawaiian, but no Bangladeshi,

415
00:44:28,000 --> 00:44:32,240
which is a 40,000, 50,000 person community 
in the metro area, the second largest in the

416
00:44:32,240 --> 00:44:36,880
United States. And so they would have had to write 
that down, too. They would just show up as Asian,

417
00:44:36,880 --> 00:44:42,320
and Arabs just show up as white, essentially, 
in the census. And so, we had a challenge here,

418
00:44:42,320 --> 00:44:48,480
because they wouldn't just show up like Latinos 
might and Blacks and others might show up.

419
00:44:48,480 --> 00:44:54,640
DO: The second challenge, though, beyond the 
census, is that, this is the map of our area here,

420
00:44:54,640 --> 00:45:03,840
and each of these dots is a census data point from 
the 2010 census, to give you an idea of the census

421
00:45:03,840 --> 00:45:10,240
issues. The green is the Black population of 
Detroit area; the blue is the white population of

422
00:45:10,240 --> 00:45:16,400
Detroit area; the orange is the Latino population; 
and the red is the Asian population. And as I was

423
00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:22,960
saying, the Arab population is around the Detroit 
area, but they show up entirely as white in the

424
00:45:22,960 --> 00:45:27,440
census figuring. The Latino population, Hispanic 
population, does show up as orange in southwest

425
00:45:27,440 --> 00:45:33,440
Detroit, but the Bangladeshi community, which is 
the Hamtramck area, is red, as any other Asian

426
00:45:33,440 --> 00:45:39,600
community is. In the Clarkston and in Bloomfield 
Hills, and Troy, and Rochester area, those Asian

427
00:45:39,600 --> 00:45:45,440
communities are primarily Indian communities. 
So the census doesn't differentiate, and this

428
00:45:45,440 --> 00:45:53,880
was a challenge to exactly figure out how to 
explain to the commissioners where people lived.

429
00:45:53,880 --> 00:45:59,200
DO: The fundamental issues, though, beyond the 
census are these: The community challenges for

430
00:45:59,200 --> 00:46:03,440
minority communities is, to begin with, the 
lack of knowledge on processes is very often,

431
00:46:03,440 --> 00:46:10,480
particularly distant in terms of these sorts 
of processes. There's also a lack of efficacy,

432
00:46:10,480 --> 00:46:15,600
that is, the sense, the perception, that "My 
vote doesn't count, my voice is never heard,

433
00:46:15,600 --> 00:46:20,560
what difference does it make if I participate?" 
And finally, a lack of trust, that is,

434
00:46:20,560 --> 00:46:24,080
"Even if I do participate, it's not going to 
matter because the system is already set up.

435
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:29,840
And that we don't trust politicians to do anything 
for us anyway." These were serious challenges to

436
00:46:29,840 --> 00:46:35,200
overcome for the census, and they appeared as 
well for redistricting. And it's not the same

437
00:46:35,200 --> 00:46:40,240
for everyone. Latinos have different issues of 
trust, for example, than Native Americans do.

438
00:46:40,800 --> 00:46:45,440
Speaking with Native Americans, it became 
clear, for example, that the memory in the

439
00:46:45,440 --> 00:46:50,480
elders of the community of the US government 
coming and forcibly taking children away to

440
00:46:54,160 --> 00:47:01,440
the boarding schools against the wishes of their 
parents is a lingering memory of mistrust with the

441
00:47:01,440 --> 00:47:06,880
US government and anything that the government 
promotes. Whereas for the Latinos, for example,

442
00:47:06,880 --> 00:47:16,640
the mistrust is mixed with fear of being 
somehow fingered and threatened by agents.

443
00:47:17,680 --> 00:47:21,760
So the mixture is different 
but is there for all of them.

444
00:47:21,760 --> 00:47:28,400
DO: The redistricting required additional 
issues than the census development. Here,

445
00:47:28,400 --> 00:47:31,920
it wasn't just a matter of convincing 
people that "Look, this is important,

446
00:47:31,920 --> 00:47:35,520
it's coming in the mail, just fill it 
out and send it back, it's simple."

447
00:47:35,520 --> 00:47:39,920
Here, what needed to happen was people had to 
actually come together and figure out, "What is

448
00:47:39,920 --> 00:47:45,360
our community of interest?" Leadership had to be 
formed, political leadership, to actually bring

449
00:47:45,360 --> 00:47:52,560
people together and start discussing issues of 
identity. The Black community has Afro-Caribbean,

450
00:47:52,560 --> 00:47:56,880
has West African, has Senegalese, their 
issues of identity are not so simple to

451
00:47:57,840 --> 00:48:03,240
figure out just from a distance. And so these had 
to be figured out as well in the conversations.

452
00:48:03,240 --> 00:48:09,520
DO: And finally, the ask here is much higher 
than fill out 10 questions in the census;

453
00:48:09,520 --> 00:48:16,880
the ask here is to actually go make public comment 
at some center that the commission is meeting at.

454
00:48:17,600 --> 00:48:22,400
The ask here is actually to learn Districtr, which 
is a great program, by the way, and it's simple,

455
00:48:22,400 --> 00:48:26,720
but still, relatively a technological 
challenge to overcome at some point,

456
00:48:26,720 --> 00:48:32,160
I had to figure it out myself, to ask people to 
actually go and draw a map and then submit it.

457
00:48:33,040 --> 00:48:36,960
These were much higher asks than 
were required by the census,

458
00:48:36,960 --> 00:48:42,960
and so these were serious challenges in this 
process of working on redistricting. So,

459
00:48:43,920 --> 00:48:50,640
what we ended up doing was we ended up putting 
together a campaign that comprised partly of

460
00:48:50,640 --> 00:48:57,040
advertising, as I mentioned, in Arabic, Bengali 
and Spanish. We spread the messaging across

461
00:48:57,040 --> 00:49:03,600
the State of Michigan to 40 plus outlets. There 
wasn't a budget for more than 40 for this effort.

462
00:49:03,600 --> 00:49:10,560
DO: In terms of messaging, it became essential 
to create relevance here, and relevance wasn't

463
00:49:11,280 --> 00:49:17,200
just fair elections. What we hear most often in 
conversations about redistricting is that this

464
00:49:17,200 --> 00:49:21,840
is a fair way to run elections. And it's true, 
it is, obviously, but for the communities that

465
00:49:21,840 --> 00:49:30,080
I am dealing with, for Arab, Latino, Bengali, and 
others, the point wasn't fair elections as much

466
00:49:30,080 --> 00:49:35,520
as it was community resources, access to 
resources. That is, making that connection,

467
00:49:35,520 --> 00:49:40,960
that if you have voice, you can elect someone 
to speak for you in the Michigan house, you can

468
00:49:40,960 --> 00:49:45,440
elect someone to speak for you in the Michigan 
senate in the US congress, and that's the only

469
00:49:45,440 --> 00:49:50,480
way or a prime way of making sure that you get 
the resources that you need for your communities,

470
00:49:50,480 --> 00:49:54,880
whether it's small business development grants, 
whether it's English as second language resources,

471
00:49:54,880 --> 00:49:59,680
whether it's mental health resources, whether 
it's issues of pollution. Wayne County is one of

472
00:49:59,680 --> 00:50:04,160
the most polluted counties in America, and the 
Arab community has wanted pollution controls,

473
00:50:04,160 --> 00:50:07,760
the Latino community has wanted pollution 
controls, they haven't been able to get them.

474
00:50:07,760 --> 00:50:14,400
DO: This is the way to do it. This redistricting 
is about having resources for your home

475
00:50:14,400 --> 00:50:22,240
communities. This is the best way to ensure that 
your voice is heard. This became the key messaging

476
00:50:22,240 --> 00:50:28,800
that I was able to put together. And in addition, 
I went and created maps to try to understand and

477
00:50:28,800 --> 00:50:32,080
show people where they were and how they were 
spread up. I will go through them very quickly for

478
00:50:32,080 --> 00:50:39,280
you. This is the house, current, not the proposed 
ones, this is the current house maps of southeast

479
00:50:39,280 --> 00:50:44,400
Michigan. The horizontal lines is the Latino 
community, the dotted box in the middle is the

480
00:50:44,400 --> 00:50:49,600
Arab community, and the Bengali community is the 
small one on the right. You can see the Latino

481
00:50:49,600 --> 00:50:54,080
community currently is spread across two house 
districts, and so that is 70,000, 80,000 people

482
00:50:54,080 --> 00:51:00,720
split into two, 40,000 voices each half as 
powerful as otherwise. The Arab community is

483
00:51:00,720 --> 00:51:07,200
spread across multiple house districts. Here 
is the Michigan senate in southeast Michigan.

484
00:51:07,200 --> 00:51:12,320
The Latino community now is split across three 
senate districts, the Arab community is split

485
00:51:12,320 --> 00:51:18,880
across two senate districts, and the Bengali 
community is within one. And then this is the

486
00:51:20,000 --> 00:51:26,160
Michigan congressional area for US Congress. 
The dotted ones here is the Black community.

487
00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:30,960
You can see how the Black community is packed, 
by the way, into two congressional districts.

488
00:51:30,960 --> 00:51:35,200
DO: But here, the Latino community is 
spread across two congressional districts,

489
00:51:35,200 --> 00:51:39,120
the Arab community is across two congressional 
districts, and the Bengali community that's

490
00:51:39,120 --> 00:51:45,200
extended northward is spread across two different 
congressional districts as well. This was a way

491
00:51:45,200 --> 00:51:50,800
to bring the point home that this is how we are 
split up. This is how our voice gets diluted,

492
00:51:50,800 --> 00:51:57,600
this is how you lose a chance to speak up. 
So, it wasn't enough, though, just to have

493
00:51:57,600 --> 00:52:03,440
the advertisements. We organized meetings, we 
organized events, we organized public talks.

494
00:52:03,440 --> 00:52:08,800
I probably gave six to seven talks to the Bengali 
community. This is the Bengali community as they

495
00:52:10,320 --> 00:52:16,960
have identified it, going from Hamtramck up to 
Warren or Warren area all the way up more or less

496
00:52:16,960 --> 00:52:22,000
to Sterling Heights. And the Arab community, we 
met together a number of times and put together

497
00:52:22,000 --> 00:52:26,000
the map of the Arab community. This is the 
self-identified map of the Arab community,

498
00:52:26,000 --> 00:52:31,440
this is the map that's been, sent more or less, 
this map, to multiple times to the commission

499
00:52:31,440 --> 00:52:36,480
for them to consider. This was the only way 
for Arab community to identify themselves,

500
00:52:36,480 --> 00:52:41,680
was to do it and to show it; otherwise, it 
would show up as White to the commissioners.

501
00:52:41,680 --> 00:52:45,920
DO: The Latino community, similarly, a number 
of times, a number of meetings, a number of

502
00:52:45,920 --> 00:52:50,560
conversations, personal conversations, people 
sent emails, text messages to each other,

503
00:52:50,560 --> 00:52:57,440
it became really an organizing effort, a political 
effort, to create engagement and activism,

504
00:52:57,440 --> 00:53:01,840
and it worked incredibly well with the Bengali 
community, that at one of the public hearings,

505
00:53:01,840 --> 00:53:08,000
20 different people came and took voice to tell 
the commission where the Bengali community was.

506
00:53:08,720 --> 00:53:13,760
I can show you very briefly the results, and I'm 
actually grateful to the commission for taking

507
00:53:13,760 --> 00:53:20,000
into account these voices. These are some of the 
preliminary maps that they have drawn. This is

508
00:53:20,000 --> 00:53:23,760
the old on the left, and the new on the right. 
You can see that that for the house district,

509
00:53:23,760 --> 00:53:29,440
the Latinos are now in a single house district, 
the Bengalis are in a more or less house district,

510
00:53:30,400 --> 00:53:34,800
and the Arab community is across mainly two 
house districts as opposed to the old splits.

511
00:53:34,800 --> 00:53:38,000
DO: This is the senate, the proposed 
senate districts. The Latinos are,

512
00:53:38,000 --> 00:53:44,000
again, a one Senate district, which is the 
way it should be. The Bengalis are now across

513
00:53:44,000 --> 00:53:49,360
the eighth district in a single district 
going northward, and the Arab community

514
00:53:49,360 --> 00:53:54,320
is across primarily two senate districts, 
but really in the 10th district, which is,

515
00:53:54,880 --> 00:53:58,880
sorry, the ninth district, primarily the green 
one, and to some extent, the 10th district,

516
00:53:58,880 --> 00:54:04,560
but the Arab community is in one district as well, 
which is really what they wanted also. This is the

517
00:54:04,560 --> 00:54:12,240
US congress, and here it's also well done. 
The Bengalis and Latinos are in a single

518
00:54:12,240 --> 00:54:15,280
district and the Arab community 
is in a single district as well.

519
00:54:15,280 --> 00:54:23,600
DO: This is how it should be. This is what I 
expected out of the redistricting process if

520
00:54:23,600 --> 00:54:33,600
it were fair. This is what American democracy 
is about when it works. As I would say during

521
00:54:33,600 --> 00:54:37,840
my speeches in a number of these cases, is 
that someone is going to make a decision,

522
00:54:38,400 --> 00:54:42,000
and unless you are at the table 
and your voice is heard by others,

523
00:54:42,800 --> 00:54:49,120
the decision will not take you into account. 
We have a beautiful and powerful democracy

524
00:54:49,840 --> 00:54:54,880
as a system, but it needs engagement, it needs 
participation, it needs the voices to be heard,

525
00:54:54,880 --> 00:54:58,960
and this was a way for minority 
communities across the state,

526
00:54:59,680 --> 00:55:06,000
especially in southeast Michigan where I really 
work hard with New Michigan Media, this was the

527
00:55:06,000 --> 00:55:14,800
way to make the redistricting work for minority 
communities. Well, that's it, I went through it

528
00:55:14,800 --> 00:55:19,840
quickly, I apologize about the... We were given 
10 minutes, so I hope it made sense, thank you.

529
00:55:19,840 --> 00:55:26,080
SM: Thank you, Hayg, and that was great, and 
I think there is so much to impact there with

530
00:55:26,080 --> 00:55:33,840
what you said, so, I wanna go back to you in a 
minute when we start doing questions and answers.

531
00:55:34,960 --> 00:55:42,080
All the other panelists are also with us, they're 
ready to answer some of your questions. I want to

532
00:55:42,080 --> 00:55:47,440
remind you all that, again, we wanna hear for you, 
so if you have not submitted your question, please

533
00:55:47,440 --> 00:55:54,000
do it on the YouTube chat or the Facebook chat, 
and you can use the hashtag policy talks to submit

534
00:55:54,000 --> 00:55:59,040
your question via Tweeter, and I love saying the 
hashtag thing because it just sounds pretty cool.

535
00:55:59,040 --> 00:56:07,760
SH: Alright, I wanna start with questions with 
Sue because I think it might be on top of mind for

536
00:56:07,760 --> 00:56:13,040
many folks, and it's about timeline and whether 
the commission will meet their timeline, right?

537
00:56:13,040 --> 00:56:17,920
So we know the commission just completed its 
drafts for house, senate, and congressional

538
00:56:17,920 --> 00:56:22,880
districts. There are still a couple of things 
that need to happen like the draft maps need to

539
00:56:22,880 --> 00:56:28,080
go through a partisan fairness evaluation, 
as well as voting rights act evaluation,

540
00:56:28,640 --> 00:56:34,720
but the clock is ticking for you all, and as you 
know, Sue, the deadlines are quickly approaching.

541
00:56:34,720 --> 00:56:39,040
We've heard commissioners are feeling a little bit 
nervous about the deadline, they've talked about

542
00:56:39,040 --> 00:56:45,440
potentially cutting down the number of hearings 
for the second round or maybe pushing the November

543
00:56:45,440 --> 00:56:52,080
5th deadline a little bit farther down the road. 
Can the audience be confident that the commission

544
00:56:52,080 --> 00:56:57,600
will have finalized maps by the end of the year? 
'Cause that's the goal, by at least December 30th,

545
00:56:58,640 --> 00:57:04,560
it's the first day you guys can vote for the final 
map, so, with all these deadlines approaching, can

546
00:57:04,560 --> 00:57:11,840
the audience be confident that there will be maps 
by the end of the year? Oh, Sue, you're muted.

547
00:57:13,640 --> 00:57:15,680
SH: Okay, it was my turn.

548
00:57:15,680 --> 00:57:16,520
[chuckle]

549
00:57:16,520 --> 00:57:18,107
SM: There you go.

550
00:57:18,107 --> 00:57:24,720
SH: The commission is working very hard and is 
being given the resources that they need in order

551
00:57:24,720 --> 00:57:34,480
to draft the map. So, again, they have a timeline, 
they have a schedule, they will meet that December

552
00:57:34,480 --> 00:57:42,880
30th vote. That is very necessary for the Board 
of Elections to do their work in order to host...

553
00:57:44,720 --> 00:57:50,000
So candidates know what district they live in, 
they wanna know where they can run for office and

554
00:57:50,000 --> 00:57:59,040
where people can be involved in voting for them. 
So, yes, the work has to be done by December 30th,

555
00:57:59,040 --> 00:58:05,280
that is our goal, that's the end in sight, and 
we're going to continue to work toward that goal.

556
00:58:06,080 --> 00:58:11,360
They're working very hard, they're doing 
everything they can to do their job well.

557
00:58:13,440 --> 00:58:20,480
Hayg, you gave me chills when you thanked the 
commission for taking that public comment in and

558
00:58:20,480 --> 00:58:24,640
acting on it. That's exactly what they're 
doing, they're taking communities of interest

559
00:58:25,440 --> 00:58:30,800
into consideration, they know the criteria 
that's listed in the constitution, they're

560
00:58:32,240 --> 00:58:39,440
utilizing that criteria in a non-partisan manner. 
I'm pleased with the way they work together

561
00:58:40,480 --> 00:58:46,240
in drafting maps. They're a wonderful group 
of people that are really, really committed

562
00:58:46,240 --> 00:58:52,080
to the process and committing to getting the 
job done. So, they will get the job done.

563
00:58:53,680 --> 00:58:59,520
SM: Alright. And talking about deadlines, Sue, we 
know the commission has already been sued for not

564
00:58:59,520 --> 00:59:06,640
meeting the constitutionally-mandated deadline for 
draft maps, which was September 17th. And I think

565
00:59:06,640 --> 00:59:10,240
there is this expectation, and it's fair to say, 
there is this expectation that the commission will

566
00:59:10,800 --> 00:59:17,600
be challenged again once the draft maps are 
voted and are put out. So, curious to know,

567
00:59:17,600 --> 00:59:24,560
how will lawsuits against the MICRC will affect 
the timeline but also the adoption of the maps.

568
00:59:25,480 --> 00:59:32,080
SH: I don't think they'll have any impact on 
the work of the commission. So, no matter what

569
00:59:32,080 --> 00:59:39,120
comes their way, the commission is committed to 
the end goal, and that is to have a final vote

570
00:59:39,120 --> 00:59:46,400
on maps on December 30th. Prior to that, there 
will be a 45-day period of public comments, so,

571
00:59:47,200 --> 00:59:53,120
the schedule has been built to make sure that 
all the work gets done within that time alloted.

572
00:59:53,120 --> 00:59:57,200
SM: So the commission is not expecting 
lawsuits to impact their work?

573
00:59:58,960 --> 01:00:04,080
SH: I think they have the goal in sight. They're 
gonna continue their work one foot in front of

574
01:00:04,080 --> 01:00:11,280
the other every day as they meet to draft maps 
and make sure they get the work done. They're

575
01:00:12,080 --> 01:00:18,640
committed to listening to the people of Michigan, 
they're committed to doing the job, and they're

576
01:00:18,640 --> 01:00:24,080
committed to following the criteria in the 
constitution in an open and transparent manner.

577
01:00:24,760 --> 01:00:31,280
SM: Wonderful. And Bob, I have a question for 
you. You've been working with, like you mentioned,

578
01:00:31,280 --> 01:00:36,800
many communities here in the state. I'm curious 
to know, what has been the biggest challenge for

579
01:00:36,800 --> 01:00:42,480
you and your group as you try to convince these 
communities that you work with that they have

580
01:00:42,480 --> 01:00:47,280
to get involved and that it's important that they 
submit the maps but also show up at the hearing?

581
01:00:47,880 --> 01:00:58,560
BC: Well, we're fortunate in that we mostly work 
with nonprofits who have organized themselves, and

582
01:01:00,320 --> 01:01:10,000
are coming with both the idea of where they 
are, so a lot of the populations that Hayg was

583
01:01:10,000 --> 01:01:20,160
talking about are working with nonprofits to 
help them to basically tell their story. And so,

584
01:01:20,880 --> 01:01:28,320
we're not having to chase people down. There are 
many, many groups out there who really wanna tell

585
01:01:28,320 --> 01:01:35,920
their story, and I think there's challenges 
with any kind of technology. I'm a technology

586
01:01:35,920 --> 01:01:42,080
entrepreneur, I face this every day, which is 
you can't make a perfect piece of software for

587
01:01:42,080 --> 01:01:48,160
every person in society. And so, there are just 
challenges there that people have to overcome.

588
01:01:49,280 --> 01:01:55,760
And so that's why we really decided to take 
a step back, and instead of putting our

589
01:01:55,760 --> 01:02:02,480
software forward, we provide a service. 
And that is to sit down and take away

590
01:02:03,920 --> 01:02:09,440
the technological barrier for people and 
operate it ourselves, make the maps with them,

591
01:02:09,440 --> 01:02:14,880
send them drafts. And we tell them that "You can 
print out this map and draw on it with a crayon,

592
01:02:15,440 --> 01:02:20,320
and I will send back another 
version to give you what you want."

593
01:02:20,320 --> 01:02:25,440
BC: So, we're fortunate that we're 
working with such a great group of people,

594
01:02:26,800 --> 01:02:32,960
but I think one of the biggest 
challenges that we face is not just,

595
01:02:34,400 --> 01:02:42,240
"Do you wanna get involved and do a map?", but 
"What happens next?" So, questions about how will

596
01:02:43,040 --> 01:02:49,280
the redistricting commission take into account all 
of these communities of interest that are being

597
01:02:49,280 --> 01:02:54,880
submitted, some of them good, some of them bad. 
And how will they delineate between all of those

598
01:02:54,880 --> 01:03:03,760
things? And so that's why we take the further step 
of helping them to not just explain their story,

599
01:03:04,800 --> 01:03:10,320
make their map, and we submit it. I 
operate Districtr every day, I'm on the

600
01:03:10,320 --> 01:03:19,280
michiganmapping.org every day, and so we do that 
work on behalf of these communities of interest.

601
01:03:19,920 --> 01:03:26,400
BC: But they wanna know what happens next. 
And that's not entirely out of our control,

602
01:03:26,400 --> 01:03:31,840
we help them to go gather support from 
their community, so they become kind

603
01:03:31,840 --> 01:03:36,720
of a representative. And many of these groups, 
as Hayg was talking about, they work across...

604
01:03:39,040 --> 01:03:43,840
The Arab community is not just one group 
of people, as Hayg was saying, they work

605
01:03:43,840 --> 01:03:53,680
across many. And so, what do they get out of 
it becomes a big question. We gather support

606
01:03:53,680 --> 01:03:58,720
and ask for people to go, if they support 
the ideas of this community of interest,

607
01:03:58,720 --> 01:04:06,160
go and make a comment so that the commission can 
know that this map doesn't just sit out there

608
01:04:07,280 --> 01:04:12,880
unattended to amongst the thousands of others that 
have been submitted. But "This one's important,

609
01:04:12,880 --> 01:04:17,840
we have support for our community of 
interest. It's not just me speaking."

610
01:04:20,040 --> 01:04:28,880
SM: Right, and Hayg, I wanna go to you. Bob 
mentioned some of your work, and I wanna go to

611
01:04:28,880 --> 01:04:33,520
something you said earlier in your presentation, 
which is the fact that communities of color and

612
01:04:33,520 --> 01:04:39,600
immigrant communities, many of them are not aware 
of this redistricting process because they have

613
01:04:39,600 --> 01:04:45,680
been left out of many political processes. 
But there has also been this historical fear

614
01:04:46,240 --> 01:04:53,840
of, for example, filling out the census, and now 
you're asking them to go in front of a commission,

615
01:04:53,840 --> 01:05:01,440
which is an arm of the government, and present 
and tell them what they would like to see.

616
01:05:01,440 --> 01:05:08,080
So, can you share a little bit, have you been 
able to help these communities overcome that fear?

617
01:05:08,960 --> 01:05:13,200
And also relate, again, if you can go a 
little deeper on how can you make them

618
01:05:13,200 --> 01:05:17,280
relate to this redistricting process, 
which, as a reporter covering redistricting,

619
01:05:17,280 --> 01:05:22,800
we know it's not the sexiest topic out there. 
So how can you help them make them relate to it?

620
01:05:23,680 --> 01:05:31,200
DO: We worked hard. There was no magic wand to 
wave and something magic to say and that it would

621
01:05:31,840 --> 01:05:37,600
take care of it. It was a lot of work, and a lot 
of, as Bob said, a lot of community organizations,

622
01:05:38,960 --> 01:05:45,680
nonprofit service agencies, social service 
agencies, all worked to get the word out.

623
01:05:46,640 --> 01:05:52,800
And yet, you have to realize that this is 
both a technological ask that's kind of high

624
01:05:52,800 --> 01:05:59,360
and learning the Districtr or any program to 
put the map. And even with all the ways in

625
01:05:59,360 --> 01:06:08,240
which it's been made to be easier, it's still a 
challenge. And then as you mentioned, the overall

626
01:06:08,240 --> 01:06:16,960
fear or lack of trust, mistrust of anything 
that's federal that is going to actually come home

627
01:06:16,960 --> 01:06:22,000
to help them. We worked really, really hard on the 
census, and yet Detroit's response rate was 51%.

628
01:06:22,800 --> 01:06:29,760
DO: But we also worked really hard in Hamtramck, 
and that response rate went from 50% to 70%. So,

629
01:06:32,080 --> 01:06:42,240
you do the best you can, and there's just no 
easy way to overcome the historical... The

630
01:06:42,240 --> 01:06:50,560
remnants of history in people's memories, recent 
and old. When you see treatment of Haitians,

631
01:06:50,560 --> 01:06:53,760
for example, at the border, and we have 
a few thousand Haitians in the area,

632
01:06:54,400 --> 01:06:59,200
and they live nearby, and we publish... 
I placed a messaging in the Haitian

633
01:07:00,320 --> 01:07:05,200
newsletter to get them to participate in 
redistricting. But it was very, very difficult

634
01:07:05,200 --> 01:07:11,680
to get even one person to come to a public 
comment session or have a few maps submitted.

635
01:07:11,680 --> 01:07:16,080
DO: We also realized something, though, 
that's important that I meant to mention,

636
01:07:16,880 --> 01:07:20,720
Sergio, is that we assume... And a 
lot of these communities are run by

637
01:07:20,720 --> 01:07:25,040
community organizations. They're sort of 
the leaders that run these communities. The

638
01:07:25,040 --> 01:07:30,080
assumption had been that if, let's say, one of the 
leading community organizations submitted a map,

639
01:07:30,080 --> 01:07:34,320
that that map would be given more importance 
because it came from a leadership organization.

640
01:07:34,880 --> 01:07:38,720
But we learned eventually that that's not the 
case, that all the maps are simply added together

641
01:07:38,720 --> 01:07:44,240
in some kind of a pile to see a pattern. And so, 
switching tactics to send as many as we could

642
01:07:44,240 --> 01:07:49,920
became the approach, but it's not the way people 
had thought of this. That is, people have thought

643
01:07:49,920 --> 01:07:55,360
if ACCESS, for example, the big social service 
agency in Detroit, sends a map, or if DHDC,

644
01:07:55,360 --> 01:08:00,000
the Detroit Hispanic Development Corporation, 
sends a map, because it represents so many people,

645
01:08:00,000 --> 01:08:04,960
because it's a leadership organization, that 
its map would be given sort of prominence or

646
01:08:04,960 --> 01:08:08,640
preeminence in some fashion. But knowing and 
learning that that wasn't the case, actually,

647
01:08:09,360 --> 01:08:14,400
was difficult in some ways, and we had to figure 
ways to overcome it by adding numbers to it.

648
01:08:14,400 --> 01:08:19,200
DO: But yes, these communities are all different 
and they all share certain reluctance to

649
01:08:19,200 --> 01:08:25,600
participate in the democracy systems that we 
have to their detriment. And learning that,

650
01:08:26,160 --> 01:08:32,080
I think, made a difference. Understanding how 
they would be deprived of resources if they

651
01:08:32,080 --> 01:08:37,840
didn't participate, and seeing how their 
voice had been cut in half or in a third

652
01:08:38,720 --> 01:08:44,080
on a map, I think helped make them 
willing to take the time and do it.

653
01:08:45,720 --> 01:08:54,240
SM: Thank you, Hayg. I wanna pivot to Moon here. 
I've read the reports that MGGG and you have put

654
01:08:54,240 --> 01:08:58,400
out for the commission, and by the way, everyone 
can find those reports, their weekly reports,

655
01:08:58,400 --> 01:09:04,960
on the commission's website. And there, we can 
see how you've been able to capture communities

656
01:09:04,960 --> 01:09:10,960
of interest and have submitted comment. And at 
some point, Moon, we've seen that from one week

657
01:09:10,960 --> 01:09:14,880
to another, there was an increase, an exponential 
increase, in submissions, and then we saw

658
01:09:14,880 --> 01:09:20,400
another increase and another increase. You work 
with other states, I'm curious to know if that

659
01:09:20,400 --> 01:09:27,200
increase in submissions of communities of interest 
have surprised you, and also, how do you compare

660
01:09:27,840 --> 01:09:32,160
the COI participation in Michigan 
with those in other states?

661
01:09:33,360 --> 01:09:39,600
DD: Sure. So let's see. So, first of all, across 
the different states we're working in, there are

662
01:09:39,600 --> 01:09:46,960
a few things that drive numbers and submissions. 
And one of them is, even in this COVID moment,

663
01:09:47,920 --> 01:09:53,600
in-person meetings tend to be real 
drivers. So for instance, one week,

664
01:09:53,600 --> 01:09:58,640
we saw a huge number of submissions coming from 
Midland, and then looked it up and found that

665
01:09:58,640 --> 01:10:04,640
there had been a community meeting there. 
And I think that's great. What happens is

666
01:10:04,640 --> 01:10:10,400
that there's still a lot of power to people 
getting together, talking through the tool,

667
01:10:10,400 --> 01:10:16,400
how it's supposed to be used, how it's gonna 
have a downstream impact on political power.

668
01:10:17,040 --> 01:10:21,600
And then people go home and submit. 
So, that's one kind of driver.

669
01:10:21,600 --> 01:10:28,000
DD: Another one is, at a certain point, there 
was a big imbalance in the Michigan portal

670
01:10:28,000 --> 01:10:31,600
especially compared to some of the 
other states we were working with, where

671
01:10:31,600 --> 01:10:37,200
really, the vast majority in the early weeks of 
submissions to the portal were written testimony.

672
01:10:37,200 --> 01:10:42,240
So there's three different kinds of submissions 
you can make that are primary submissions:

673
01:10:43,120 --> 01:10:47,200
You can make a written comment, you can write down 
anything you would say at a microphone in a public

674
01:10:47,200 --> 01:10:52,240
hearing, you can draw redistricting plan, whole or 
partial, or you can draw a community of interest.

675
01:10:52,240 --> 01:10:55,360
And what we were seeing was well 
over half of the submissions

676
01:10:55,360 --> 01:11:01,680
were of the written kind. Within those, many 
of them were actually just verbally describing

677
01:11:02,960 --> 01:11:11,280
what would ultimately be a COI, a community of 
interest. So, one thing that we did was ask the

678
01:11:11,280 --> 01:11:16,320
commission if they would like to reach back out 
to the written submitters and invite them to map

679
01:11:16,320 --> 01:11:22,880
their submission. And then we worked with MDOS to 
draft an email, and sent an email out to all the

680
01:11:22,880 --> 01:11:27,360
people who had submitted written testimony, 
inviting them to come to training sessions.

681
01:11:27,360 --> 01:11:31,280
DD: This is another piece, as you 
heard from all the other presenters,

682
01:11:31,840 --> 01:11:37,600
any new technology, new or old, any 
technology has a certain barrier to entry,

683
01:11:39,120 --> 01:11:44,960
and that's definitely true of public mapping 
software. So we've been holding training sessions,

684
01:11:46,080 --> 01:11:49,200
multiple, free, and open training 
sessions, a week, we're still doing them,

685
01:11:50,880 --> 01:11:56,880
and some in English, some in Spanish. We 
have training materials, we have videos in

686
01:11:58,000 --> 01:12:01,520
not only English and Spanish, but 
also for other parts of the country,

687
01:12:01,520 --> 01:12:10,320
in Haitian Creole and Navajo. And so, a big part 
of making a tool accessible is putting in the time

688
01:12:10,320 --> 01:12:16,720
to work with people and show them how to 
take their ideas and turn them into pixels.

689
01:12:16,720 --> 01:12:22,320
DD: So, that was another huge turning 
point in the types of submissions we

690
01:12:22,320 --> 01:12:26,000
saw in the portal. Once that message 
went out to the written submitters,

691
01:12:26,000 --> 01:12:33,760
a huge uptick in the number of mapped 
submissions followed. So that's been cool to see,

692
01:12:33,760 --> 01:12:39,520
how different kinds of activities and different 
kinds of portal activity can be traced back often

693
01:12:39,520 --> 01:12:45,680
to a cause. You also asked about some 
of the differences in different states.

694
01:12:47,280 --> 01:12:52,800
So besides just volume, and besides the type 
of submissions, which I also just referenced,

695
01:12:54,560 --> 01:12:57,600
I think one of the interesting 
differences that we've seen across states

696
01:12:58,160 --> 01:13:06,880
is whether we see submissions that are presented 
as originating with many different individuals,

697
01:13:07,440 --> 01:13:12,400
or whether we see community and grassroots 
organizations organizing submissions

698
01:13:13,120 --> 01:13:19,280
and maybe having a drive to gather 
a lot of testimony, and then having

699
01:13:19,280 --> 01:13:24,640
an individual from the organization batch 
submit on behalf of many organization members.

700
01:13:24,640 --> 01:13:30,080
DD: In Michigan, this sort of balance was all the 
way over towards the individual, so there were

701
01:13:30,080 --> 01:13:36,320
many, many individuals and not a lot of 
patterns that indicate batching or grouping

702
01:13:36,880 --> 01:13:44,960
by organizations. It was still clear in a number 
of places that there had been a drive to organize

703
01:13:44,960 --> 01:13:50,480
people, sometimes to say similar things. I 
think this is worth mentioning, too, because

704
01:13:51,440 --> 01:13:56,480
it highlights one of the challenges, which is, 
how do you weigh all of these submissions against

705
01:13:56,480 --> 01:14:02,000
each other? I think early on in the process 
when the MICRC was meeting and reviewing them,

706
01:14:02,000 --> 01:14:05,840
there was a little bit of an inkling early on 
that they would give a thumbs up or a thumbs down

707
01:14:06,960 --> 01:14:10,880
to the various submissions. And they quickly 
learned what I think every group learned when

708
01:14:10,880 --> 01:14:14,880
they tried to do that, which is that, it's 
just really hard to draw the line between

709
01:14:16,640 --> 01:14:19,920
something that matches what you were looking 
for, and something that's a little bit different.

710
01:14:21,360 --> 01:14:26,560
And so, ranking or rating the 
submissions doesn't turn out, I think,

711
01:14:27,120 --> 01:14:30,880
and neither did the commission think, 
doesn't turn out to be very productive.

712
01:14:30,880 --> 01:14:35,680
So, there's a little bit more of a question 
of aggregation rather than sorting, right?

713
01:14:36,240 --> 01:14:43,040
DD: So I'll just mention one example that I 
thought was interesting. We actually saw... And

714
01:14:45,200 --> 01:14:51,360
I can show this as well. So we actually saw 
quite a number of submissions coming from

715
01:14:52,400 --> 01:14:57,520
the Ohio border, just maybe a 
little south of Ann Arbor. And here,

716
01:14:57,520 --> 01:15:04,640
I'll share my screen if I can get that 
working again, and show you what I mean.

717
01:15:08,480 --> 01:15:16,000
So if you take a look here, you'll see this big 
red blob, heat map, which is, in this case, 117

718
01:15:16,000 --> 01:15:21,680
submissions all coming from a similar area. And 
even when we tried to sub-cluster them, they were

719
01:15:21,680 --> 01:15:26,080
just very similar to each other both... Take a 
look at how similar this sub-cluster looks to

720
01:15:26,080 --> 01:15:30,080
this one. So we were finding them to be 
very similar both geographically and in

721
01:15:30,080 --> 01:15:34,800
terms of many of the things they said. And 
then a little bit of looking around let us

722
01:15:34,800 --> 01:15:39,600
trace back to some tweets indicating that there 
may have been kind of a campaign behind this.

723
01:15:40,160 --> 01:15:45,280
DD: Thing I wanna say about this that I think is 
interesting and important is that the existence

724
01:15:45,280 --> 01:15:51,920
of the campaign doesn't make the testimony 
a illegitimate. In fact, when you're talking

725
01:15:51,920 --> 01:15:56,240
about community, you're talking about groups, and 
so it makes perfect sense that people would band

726
01:15:56,240 --> 01:16:02,480
together and think through the themes together and 
think about what to say, but it does give you an

727
01:16:02,480 --> 01:16:09,440
interesting question later on when you're using 
all of this input, how to weight those things.

728
01:16:09,440 --> 01:16:17,440
And so, this is why we end up thinking that a 
method of clustering lets you see the themes

729
01:16:17,440 --> 01:16:23,120
from 10,000 feet up. You get to see an overview, 
you get to see kind of how things hang together

730
01:16:23,120 --> 01:16:29,680
and where they're different. So, that's just a 
little bit of the thought process that went into

731
01:16:31,760 --> 01:16:37,920
categorizing and ultimately summarizing all 
the different kinds of inputs that we saw.

732
01:16:37,920 --> 01:16:42,000
DO: Yeah, Sergio, if I can just add, this 
is exactly what we did, what Moon is saying.

733
01:16:43,040 --> 01:16:47,840
The Arab, for example, map, was [1:16:44.9] 
____, was developed, and then the link,

734
01:16:47,840 --> 01:16:53,600
the Districtr link that comes out when you save 
it. Everyone took it and sent it to their network

735
01:16:53,600 --> 01:16:58,960
of people and encouraged them to send this 
link and then send it to your friends, and

736
01:16:58,960 --> 01:17:05,920
I think there were a number of Arab maps that came 
in after we did that. But that was... And yes,

737
01:17:05,920 --> 01:17:09,120
there's nothing wrong with it, just as Moon 
said, I think this is the way to engage people,

738
01:17:09,120 --> 01:17:13,000
and this is the way to take advantage of 
networks that are densely interconnected.

739
01:17:13,000 --> 01:17:19,120
SM: And then Moon, you mentioned a campaign 
doesn't make the submissions illegitimate;

740
01:17:19,760 --> 01:17:25,920
it gives an idea of where people are. I'm 
wondering, maybe Sue can also weigh in here,

741
01:17:26,480 --> 01:17:30,000
if it makes these communities sound a 
little bit more powerful, because now

742
01:17:30,000 --> 01:17:33,520
you have 117 submissions instead of three or four.

743
01:17:33,520 --> 01:17:38,800
DD: Yeah, no, that's a great point and it's one 
that we thought about it a lot. People ask us

744
01:17:38,800 --> 01:17:46,160
all the time... And I also should mention a little 
bit more about us. So besides the folks in my lab,

745
01:17:46,160 --> 01:17:50,160
we also have collaborators around the 
country through a group we call the Open Maps

746
01:17:50,160 --> 01:17:57,760
Coalition. So we had faculty collaborators from 
Ohio State University, from St. Louis University,

747
01:17:57,760 --> 01:18:02,160
and from WashU in St. Louis, from Notre Dame. 
We have sort of a network of collaborators. So

748
01:18:02,160 --> 01:18:09,600
I wanna shout out, this was really a group effort. 
And one of the things we really thought about is,

749
01:18:10,320 --> 01:18:16,800
people in redistricting love metrics. They love 
scores and ways that you can measure how good

750
01:18:16,800 --> 01:18:22,160
of a job that you're doing or flag maybe a 
really problematic kind of map. And so we

751
01:18:22,160 --> 01:18:27,600
thought really hard about whether there should be 
a COI score, that kind of thing, and ultimately

752
01:18:27,600 --> 01:18:34,160
decided that for a lot of the reasons that have 
been discussed already, you can certainly make

753
01:18:34,160 --> 01:18:38,640
something numerical to help you think about it, 
but ultimately, it's really gonna be holistic.

754
01:18:39,280 --> 01:18:45,920
DD: I think if you... Here, again, I wanna say, 
when we started out, it wasn't clear to me whether

755
01:18:46,480 --> 01:18:51,920
the raw individual areas, like the individual 
polygons that each person had submitted,

756
01:18:51,920 --> 01:18:58,320
would be the most useful object at the end of the 
day, or whether these clusters would play a big

757
01:18:58,320 --> 01:19:03,120
role. And I think the jury is still out on how the 
commission will ultimately end up interacting with

758
01:19:03,120 --> 01:19:07,840
all this data. We just tried to give them options 
for different ways of interacting with the data.

759
01:19:08,880 --> 01:19:17,280
But I will say this: I think if you just get down 
to a counting game, like, "This cluster has 117

760
01:19:17,280 --> 01:19:22,480
submissions, and this one has only 22. Is this 
one that much more important than the other?" I

761
01:19:22,480 --> 01:19:31,200
think that that's a misleading metric, it invites 
astro-turfing. I would prefer to see something

762
01:19:31,200 --> 01:19:36,720
qualitative happening. I think that campaigns 
and coordinated grassroots efforts can be quite

763
01:19:36,720 --> 01:19:41,440
valuable. I think an individual sitting down and 
dreaming something up and writing it on their own

764
01:19:41,440 --> 01:19:48,880
behalf can be really powerful. But a metric, at 
the end of the day, if you do wanna count splits

765
01:19:48,880 --> 01:19:54,800
of these kind of submissions, in my judgment, 
that would be a better idea at the cluster level

766
01:19:54,800 --> 01:19:58,640
than at the end of a dual submission level, 
because you don't wanna turn it into like...

767
01:19:58,640 --> 01:20:03,040
DD: Any time you set up a metric, you have to 
think about how it will be gained, and that's just

768
01:20:03,040 --> 01:20:06,880
universal. Anytime you have a score, you have 
to think about the incentives that it creates.

769
01:20:07,840 --> 01:20:12,240
And if you have a score here that 
overly relies on counting submissions,

770
01:20:12,240 --> 01:20:19,200
then you're creating an incentive for behavior 
that may or may not most fully reflect what

771
01:20:19,200 --> 01:20:24,160
people in groups wanna say. So I do think 
a level of aggregation gets you somewhere

772
01:20:24,160 --> 01:20:26,600
productive when it comes to submission like this.

773
01:20:26,600 --> 01:20:30,960
SM: Wonderful. Sue, I wanted 
to ask you, on Friday,

774
01:20:31,920 --> 01:20:36,800
the maps are supposed to be evaluated 
for, or starting to be evaluated for,

775
01:20:36,800 --> 01:20:41,760
partisan fairness. Can you talk to us a little bit 
about that process and what is the expectation?

776
01:20:41,760 --> 01:20:46,960
Are we expecting the lines to potentially change 
after they go through this evaluation process?

777
01:20:48,360 --> 01:20:57,360
SH: So, on Friday, Dr. Lisa Handley will be with 
us to work on partisan fairness measurements.

778
01:20:57,360 --> 01:21:02,880
She will be using three measurements. Those are 
lopsided margins, the mean, median difference,

779
01:21:02,880 --> 01:21:08,880
and the efficiency gap. However, realizing 
that these are the fourth and fifth criteria

780
01:21:10,000 --> 01:21:15,200
for the maps that are being drawn, and 
communities of interest is a much higher criteria,

781
01:21:16,160 --> 01:21:23,120
it will be very interesting and challenging 
for the commission to take in this information

782
01:21:23,120 --> 01:21:27,520
and then determine if they should adjust 
lines that have been drafted. And again,

783
01:21:27,520 --> 01:21:32,960
they're in a drafting process right now. And 
even when they go out on the road for the

784
01:21:32,960 --> 01:21:39,120
public hearings, these are draft proposed maps. 
They're going to continue to take public comment.

785
01:21:39,840 --> 01:21:48,080
So, they will continue mapping until they get to 
the point where they will have proposed plans.

786
01:21:49,400 --> 01:21:57,120
SM: Wonderful. Bob, I wanna go to 
you and I wanna hear from you here,

787
01:21:57,120 --> 01:22:03,280
because there's this question about packing. We 
hear this term often, and I'm wondering if you

788
01:22:03,280 --> 01:22:09,280
can discuss how complicated it is to avoid 
packing of community self-interests into a

789
01:22:09,280 --> 01:22:15,040
limited number of districts, for example, 
because we've heard that that could reduce

790
01:22:15,040 --> 01:22:17,840
the communities of interest's power, 
but we've also heard from some people

791
01:22:17,840 --> 01:22:29,920
who want to consolidate power as a community of 
interest. So how do you balance that? Bob, you're

792
01:22:29,920 --> 01:22:30,960
muted. [chuckle]

793
01:22:30,960 --> 01:22:42,480
BC: It's an incredibly complicated question, 
and it almost never gets the attention that

794
01:22:42,480 --> 01:22:48,640
it entirely deserves because people try to 
compartmentalize the different criteria,

795
01:22:48,640 --> 01:22:55,680
that the partisan fairness is more important, 
which is really what we're talking about if we're

796
01:22:55,680 --> 01:23:05,600
talking about packing and cracking, although it 
also can break up a coalition of a race, like two

797
01:23:05,600 --> 01:23:13,600
Black majority districts in Detroit, and there 
hasn't been one draft by the commission that gives

798
01:23:13,600 --> 01:23:25,280
that second Black majority district today. And so, 
you conflate that with communities of interest,

799
01:23:25,280 --> 01:23:31,760
which cross over these boundaries. It's super 
complicated, but I don't have the answer.

800
01:23:32,560 --> 01:23:40,480
But I'll tell you, I think who does is in the 
public portal. And we're talking about... Sue

801
01:23:40,480 --> 01:23:45,760
was talking about these steps earlier, and 
Moon, how many submissions have been made.

802
01:23:46,720 --> 01:23:55,280
We see maps in there that answer the question 
of how to keep two Black majority districts in

803
01:23:55,280 --> 01:24:06,000
Detroit with greater than 50% majority and have a 
map over [1:24:02.2] ____ submitted by a citizen.

804
01:24:06,000 --> 01:24:15,040
BC: And I think we would be doing a huge 
disservice to communities of interest to

805
01:24:15,040 --> 01:24:19,600
put them in buckets of numbers and not look at 
their stories individually, because there are

806
01:24:19,600 --> 01:24:27,520
fantastic stories in there, and I've read 500 
of them myself. So I think that the answer is

807
01:24:27,520 --> 01:24:35,920
not to put all of the work and trust into 13 
people who've never mapped anything before.

808
01:24:36,480 --> 01:24:44,400
But why can't we be looking at what others 
have done that does better to keep intact

809
01:24:44,400 --> 01:24:49,280
communities of interest does better, to 
meet the VRA requirements does better

810
01:24:50,160 --> 01:24:54,800
for partisanship fairness? Those examples 
sit in the portal to be used today.

811
01:24:55,480 --> 01:25:01,120
DO: And Sergio, I think one other aspect of 
this is to listen to the community itself.

812
01:25:03,600 --> 01:25:07,680
Why shouldn't they have a say in whether they 
want to be together or spread across districts?

813
01:25:08,400 --> 01:25:12,480
They understand the political process, they 
understand that it can be a minority in two

814
01:25:12,480 --> 01:25:18,240
districts or a majority in one district, and their 
voice should be taken into account, in the sense

815
01:25:18,240 --> 01:25:22,800
of the maps that they're submitting, to represent 
their own selves in the American process.

816
01:25:23,880 --> 01:25:31,120
SM: And I think for everyone listening, everyone 
keeps hitting on this point, which is like they

817
01:25:31,120 --> 01:25:37,040
wanna hear from you and you have to show up and 
you have to flood the gates and you have to talk

818
01:25:37,040 --> 01:25:43,920
to these groups, or even submit your map online. 
That's super important in order for everyone to

819
01:25:43,920 --> 01:25:52,400
have fair maps, which is why we're here. Sue, I 
have this question for you here before we close,

820
01:25:54,000 --> 01:25:57,520
and it has to do with this idea of flooding 
the gates and receiving submissions. The

821
01:25:57,520 --> 01:26:06,160
commission have been asking people to show up, 
to submit their maps, to talk to the commission,

822
01:26:06,160 --> 01:26:12,800
and I wonder, today, for example, there were 
two hours of public comments in today's meeting,

823
01:26:14,240 --> 01:26:20,640
I wonder how helpful it is to have so 
many comments, and I'm wondering, too,

824
01:26:22,000 --> 01:26:27,600
if there's something that they probably can do 
to make it easier for commissioners to draw fair

825
01:26:27,600 --> 01:26:36,560
maps. Is it maybe submitting group proposals, or 
is it maybe having other type of interaction with

826
01:26:36,560 --> 01:26:41,360
the commission? What would make it easier for a 
commissioners to draw fair maps and better maps?

827
01:26:43,880 --> 01:26:51,280
SH: Well, it's a tough job. There's no doubt 
about it. [chuckle] The rank criteria make it

828
01:26:52,880 --> 01:27:00,320
a very challenging job. Again, these are 
ordinary citizens that have been given this task

829
01:27:00,960 --> 01:27:06,800
through a lottery process of selection, so, 
very interesting process they're involved in,

830
01:27:06,800 --> 01:27:12,720
but they do want to hear from people. They do 
believe that every comment counts, whether they

831
01:27:12,720 --> 01:27:19,680
receive one or whether they receive 100 similar 
comments. So they really encourage people to give

832
01:27:19,680 --> 01:27:27,360
their comment. They will certainly listen and take 
that into consideration as they draw. So, again,

833
01:27:27,360 --> 01:27:33,680
it's just really, really important for people to 
show up, to speak up, they can call into meetings,

834
01:27:33,680 --> 01:27:40,560
they can show up at public hearings or meetings. 
They can get on the public comment portal

835
01:27:40,560 --> 01:27:45,840
and give their comments. So we really, really 
encourage people to be involved. This is about

836
01:27:45,840 --> 01:27:51,600
engaging the residents of Michigan in this 
historic process, and we wanna hear from you.

837
01:27:51,600 --> 01:27:56,560
SM: I think it's important to remind people 
again that in two weeks, the commission is

838
01:27:56,560 --> 01:28:02,800
expected to hit the road for their second round 
of public hearings. It would start on October

839
01:28:04,560 --> 01:28:10,480
11th in Flint, and then they'll go out to Gaylord, 
and they'll continue traveling across the state,

840
01:28:10,480 --> 01:28:14,000
but you don't have to wait until those 
public hearings to happen for you to

841
01:28:14,000 --> 01:28:17,920
submit your comment. Again, you can do it 
online and through the other methods. You

842
01:28:17,920 --> 01:28:24,400
can even use snail mail to submit 
your plan. So, make sure you do it.

843
01:28:24,400 --> 01:28:30,480
SM: We have run out of time, but I 
wanna thank all the panelists, Bob,

844
01:28:30,480 --> 01:28:37,520
Hayg, Sue, and Moon for this rich conversation. 
And I also wanna thank our sponsors and

845
01:28:37,520 --> 01:28:44,800
our co-sponsors and to the audience this 
evening, you all made this happen today. And

846
01:28:44,800 --> 01:28:51,120
just a heads-up, with support from the Joyce 
Foundation, MSU's Institute for Public Policy

847
01:28:51,120 --> 01:28:56,320
and Social Research and Clos Up will evaluate 
the Michigan Independent Citizen's Redistricting

848
01:28:56,320 --> 01:29:03,520
Commission maps and the process with an interim 
report soon and a final report coming later,

849
01:29:04,160 --> 01:29:07,840
and that would be on their website and 
you can see the resources link in the chat

850
01:29:07,840 --> 01:29:15,360
to see those websites. And again, check them out, 
the website, if you're not looking at the chat,

851
01:29:15,360 --> 01:29:24,000
the website is closup.umich.edu, and that's 
spelled C L O S U P.umich.edu, and you can

852
01:29:24,000 --> 01:29:30,160
also see the video from tonight. We hope you'll 
visit resources and take part in the upcoming

853
01:29:30,160 --> 01:29:33,360
Michigan Independent Redistricting 
Commission hearings across the state.

854
01:29:33,360 --> 01:29:38,880
SM: Again, we thank you for your questions, 
your comments, and your participation today,

855
01:29:38,880 --> 01:29:42,800
and we hope to see you in the next panel, 
which I'm told is expected to take place

856
01:29:42,800 --> 01:29:49,760
later this fall. Good night, everyone.