BAMBERG – Bamberg County Council gave second reading approval to a redistricting plan during a special called meeting earlier this month.

The county is redrawing council districts to reflect changes in population, as noted in the last U.S. Census. The county’s population dropped from 15,987 in 2010 to 13,311 in 2020, a 16.7 percent decline.

Bamberg County Administrator Joey Preston explained in an email that the county adhered to the constitutional requirement of one person, one vote, with all seven council districts having a population in compliance with the requirement.

The mean district size based on the new census data for the county is 1,902 people.

The individual district populations were: District 1 – 1, 899; District 2 – 1,871; District 3 – 1,837; District 4 – 1,950; District 5 – 1,908; District 6 – 1,862 and District 7 – 1,984.

Preston said the proposed plan also adheres to the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Under that act, the county has to work toward a plan with no retrogression, or reduction in the voting strength of a racial or ethnic group.

Districts 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 remain majority-minority districts as before, he said. Districts 5 and 6 remain anchored in the Denmark area and Govan remains in District 6.

People are also reading…

Preston noted that because of population shifts, District 4, while remaining anchored in the Denmark area, grows toward Bamberg.

Districts 1 and 2 remain anchored in the Bamberg area, with District 2 seeing no change at all because of its only slight population shift.

Districts 3 and 7 remain mostly rural, with their shared boundary shifting only slightly to ensure the town of Olar will be in District 7. The town of Ehrhardt also remains in District 7.

A public hearing and final third reading of the redistricting plan is scheduled for 6 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, during the council’s regularly scheduled meeting at the courthouse annex building 1234 North St.

Contact the writer: dgleaton@timesanddemocrat.com or 803-533-5534. Follow “Good News with Gleaton” on Twitter at @DionneTandD

#pu-email-form-daily-email-article { clear: both; background-color: #fff; color: #222; background-position: bottom; background-repeat: no-repeat; padding: 15px 20px; margin-bottom: 40px; border-top: 4px solid rgba(0,0,0,.8); border-bottom: 1px solid rgba(0,0,0,.2); display: none; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article, #pu-email-form-daily-email-article p { font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, “Segoe UI”, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif, “Apple Color Emoji”, “Segoe UI Emoji”, “Segoe UI Symbol”; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article h1 { font-size: 24px; margin: 15px 0 5px 0; font-family: “serif-ds”, Times, “Times New Roman”, serif; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article .lead { margin-bottom: 5px; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article .email-desc { font-size: 16px; line-height: 20px; margin-bottom: 5px; opacity: 0.7; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article form { padding: 10px 30px 5px 30px; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article .disclaimer { opacity: 0.5; margin-bottom: 0; line-height: 100%; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article .disclaimer a { color: #222; text-decoration: underline; } #pu-email-form-daily-email-article .email-hammer { border-bottom: 3px solid #222; opacity: .5; display: inline-block; padding: 0 10px 5px 10px; margin-bottom: -5px; font-size: 16px; } @media (max-width: 991px) { #pu-email-form-daily-email-article form { padding: 10px 0 5px 0; } }

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes:

<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>