Lee Today

City of Fort Myers issued the following announcement on Dec. 16.

About Redistricting 

Every decade since 1790, the United States has conducted an “actual enumeration” of the persons living in the country as required by Article I, Section II of the U.S. Constitution.  The Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution has been found to guarantee to the right of “one person, one vote” to municipal residents, such that a municipality must redraw its districts periodically to maintain equal population.

Official redistricting-level data (known as “P.L. 94-171” data) was delivered to states and municipalities on September 16, 2021. According to that data the population of Fort Myers has increased 38.7% from a population of 62,298 in 2010 to a population of 86,395 in 2020. A population increase of this size is highly likely to result in city commission districts with unequal populations, necessitating the re-drawing of districts to maintain compliance with the United States Constitution and the Voting Rights Act.

The Public Process of Redistricting 

Redistricting is a public process. The final ward boundaries are selected by a majority vote of the city council at a public hearing that has been advertised and publically noticed according to state law. 

1. A series of public meetings began with a city council work session on November 17th at the Southwest Florida Enterprise Center at 2:00pm to review map scenarios to bring forward as candidate maps.
2. Map options will then be presented to the public at meetings at various public facilities to obtain comments and suggestions. 
3. A second city council work session will be held on January 3rd, 2022, to discuss public comments and review for a final selection of the updated ward boundaries. 
4. January 18th City Council Meeting – Permission to advertise for a public hearing to select a final map option.
5. January 31st City Council Meeting public hearing to adopt new ward map.

Once adopted the final new ward map will be sent to the local supervisor of elections office to begin the voter precinct updates for the 2022 elections.

Candidate Maps

Download the current set of maps being reviewed by city council 

This final set of candidate maps have been selected by the city council. The proposed maps will also be presented at various public meetings to obtain public input and answer questions about the process. 

View Online 

A web map has been created. You can zoom into any area and see the street names and property lines. Click on the layer button, and you will see a list of all the candidate maps. 

Large Format Maps - (Caution Large File) - This file contains a large format map for each of the five candidate maps.  

Download the full set of maps that have been reviewed by city council 

This packet contains all of the maps that were reviewed by the city council during the November 17th public session at the Southwest Florida Enterprise Center. Maps 1,3,5,10,11 were selected as final candidantes. 

Original source can be found here.