Harrisburg, Pa. – December 16, 2021 − State Senator Jay Costa today voted in favor of the preliminary maps that were presented to the Legislative Reapportionment Commission (LRC). The preliminary maps were approved by the LRC and now enter a 30 day public comment period.
The Senate preliminary map was accepted unanimously by the commission.
“I’m proud of the preliminary product that we advanced today, as well as the thoughtful and bipartisan process we used to get here,” said Senator Costa. “After months of hearings and countless hours of testimony from experts and the public, we’ve drafted a document that creates representative seats, compact and contiguous districts, and elevates minority voices.”
This year, the LRC accepted publicly submitted maps and allowed testimony via Zoom to make the process more participatory than in the history of redistricting. There were 9 meetings, 6 hearings, 29 publicly submitted maps, testimony from 51 citizens and 29 experts.
Due to COVID related challenges, census data was delivered five months late which compressed the timeline for a preliminary map. Despite this, the Commission is submitting a map on schedule with the expected May primary for 2022.
“I hope that everyone takes a close look at the plan as a whole but more importantly, their area of the state and gives us feedback about what they like but also what they don’t like about the map,” said Senator Costa. “We will be taking those comments seriously when putting together the Final Plan.”
More information on future meetings and the preliminary map are available at redistricting.state.pa.us.