The ideal population size for each district is roughly 66,900 residents, but the law allows them to range from about 64,000 to 70,000.
When crafting the proposals, county officials merged, moved and split voting precincts to bring its five districts as close to the ideal population size as possible.
Because of the county’s butterfly shape, residents from the most populous district to the least. Instead, the process started east from Varina to Fairfield, Fairfield to Brookland, Brookland to Three Chopt and Three Chopt to Tuckahoe, county officials said in an interview last month.
According to the NAACP, the county’s proposal could dilute the voting power of people of color in the Brookland, Three Chopt and Tuckahoe districts.
Schmitt directed county staff to go through the NAACP’s plan on Tuesday, as the plan criticized the county’s plan to take residents from Fairfield and give them to Brookland.
“I concur with the request of the NAACP in their letter that we could do better,” Schmitt said.
The county planning department worked to have a slightly alternate proposal that was presented to the remaining Supervisors shortly after 10 p.m. Tuesday. The alternative plan keeps three voting precincts in Fairfield instead of moving them to Brookland, as the original county proposal suggested.
