The Seattle Redistricting Commission has settled on new borders for the city’s council districts that will shave off only small areas of District 3 representing Capitol Hill and the Central District to help balance disproportionate population growth in the city’s core.

The vote for the new Seattle City Council borders came Monday as the commissioners are nearing finalization of the new districts, backing off a last-minute adjustment that would have also carved off a portion of the University of Washington area to join D3 represented by Kshama Sawant.

A final vote on the plan is expected November 8th. The commission continues to take feedback here.

The hoped-for final border changes for District 3 include carving off a small area of the Central District south of I-90 into South Seattle’s District 2 and shifting the highrise-zoned swath of First Hill along I-5 into downtown’s District 7. D3, meanwhile, will gain areas of Eastlake that had been in District 4. You can explore the final map here.

The agreement culminates months of proposals and negotiations as the commission attempted to meet legal requirements while rebalancing populations in the districts across the city. When initially adopted for the 2015 election, each district was drawn to include roughly 88,000 people. Seattle growth has not been distributed proportionately. District 3, including Capitol Hill, the Central District, and First Hill, had grown proportionately larger reaching around 107,000 residents and needed its borders to shrink. Each district will now represent a few more than 106,000 people. Continue reading →