I wrote earlier that any reader who can keep up with Cabell County redistricting should be applauded.
It’s obvious I can’t do it. So hold the applause.
Things do seem clearer now that numerous candidates and potential candidates have contacted me since I began discussing this matter.
Let me make the first thing clear: there are now FIVE magisterial districts in Cabell County. In theory, that means the three elected commissioners only have THREE home districts.
That leads us to the argument I mentioned previously that, with five districts, two districts really do not have a “home” commissioner of their own.
In actuality, each commissioner is elected by and represents the entire county. They are not assigned to present only what is of benefit to their particular area.
Magisterial districts were likely created to assure that various parts of a county were represented and all did not come from one area.
But to the current Cabell County situation, here’s the bottom line: the county commission will realign the magisterial districts. At this point they have two proposed maps of the districts before them to be voted on December 9 — one has three districts and the other has a newly-realigned five.
Before the commission.acts on the matter, there are five districts, as noted. Delegate John Mandt Jr. is currently eligible to run against Democrat Jim Morgan next year because Mandt is not — today — in Morgan’s district.
Mandt publicly announced some time ago that he would not seek re-election to the House but would run for the commission seat in 2022.
Others have lined up to run for the House based on Mandt’s decision.
Mandt says both maps proposed by mapping private contractor Doug McKenzie put him in the district wirh sitting commissioner Republican Nancy Cartmill, whose seat is not up in 2022.
But her presence on the Commission would preclude Mandt from running against Morgan because they put Mandt in the.district with Cartmill. That district can only have only one commissioner and Cartmill is it.
Is Mandt such a threat to the courthouse regulars that they think they must shut him out at any cost? Maybe so.
In any event, magisterial redistricting is a mess in several locales. We will closely watch the Cabell one until they finish, hopefully December 9.
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It was a fascinating phone call with McKenzie, the private contractor mapper who apparently created the two proposed Cabell district maps.
One seldom knows how things happen at the Cabell seat of government. We’re just informed of it when it’s over, if at all.
So nobody I’ve talked to yet is sure who hired McKenzie, although it’s likely that County Clerk Phyllis Smith did.
After inquiry, I was given a number for McKenzie, who I promptly called.
He answered and I identified myself. I told him the first questions were, “who told you how to layout the maps? Who gave you direction on what to do?”
To say he didn’t like the questions would be an understatement. He responded with some garbled gibberish about “needing to check with the county before I answer any questions.”
I then explained that I understood he is a private contractor not used to media coverage but that public funds are being expended in the redistricting and the public has a right to know who is calling the shots.
He responded that I was not “going to tell me what to do.”
I attempted one more time to explain that I want the public to understand the process.
It was about then that he screamed, “shut up!” and hung up the phone.
Now, we might wonder, why the independent mapper is so worried about his work that he’d scream at a reporter just doing his job.
The old question rides through this story. “What is there here to hide?”
Transparency is not a quality displayed by the Cabell Commission majority.
There will be more. Much more …