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Health & Fitness

Windsor Has Been Redistricted, and is No Longer 3 Districts! More "Punishment"?

The State Redistricting Committee ignored the Town Council's request. Is this just more "punishment"?

Some 30 years ago Windsor was “punished” for backing the wrong Democrat in a statewide race, according to the Chair of the Democratic Town Committee.  The result was that Windsor was split into three districts in which Windsor did not hold a majority of the voters or population in any district. For 2012, and the next ten years, the punishment just got worse, going from the frying pan into the fire.

Windsor today consists of three districts. The 15th Windsor-Bloomfield currently represented by David Baram, the 60th Windsor-Windsor Locks represented by Peggy Sayers, and the 61st  Windsor-East Granby-Suffield represented by Elaine O’Brien, all Democrats.  The majority of the voters and the representatives come from the bold towns.

As a member of the Town Council we voted at the beginning of this year to ask and demand that Windsor have at least one singular Windsor only Representative District. That is one district made up of only Windsor Residents within the borders of Windsor. A reasonable request by the First Town in Connecticut.

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Recently the House District maps became available. We no longer have 3 districts.  Great one would think! Sorry to say, we now have FOUR districts. Yes I said 4!  The aforementioned districts are made up of the same communities PLUS the 5th House District consisting of Northern Hartford and Southern Windsor currently represented by Marie Lopez Kirkley-Bey who recently announced she is retiring at the end of the current term.

Wow, 3 districts was bad, but 4!  Was this payback for backing the wrong Democrats again?  You might remember the Windsor Democrats ran candidates in primary challenges against Rep. Baram and Sayers, both challengers losing.  The majority of the 5th district is supposed to be Windsor voters.  We are now connected through this district with voters that do not arguably have the same interests as Windsor’s voters.  The interests of Windsor are not often the same as Hartford.

Find out what's happening in Windsorwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

We will now have more different voting ballots depending on which district you live in. You will now have to learn who your current representative is, and who the candidates are, and the candidate you like may not be a candidate you can vote for. 

This is very confusing for voters. You can hear residents at a restaurant or in the barber shop having a casual conversation about who to vote for. Frank says A is a great person, Jane says so is Y, Jack says M is the guy to vote for, but they are all in different districts so the conversation to assist in making a decision is fruitless. 

The candidates aruably have it tougher. They need to know where you live, memorize the Windsor maps to know if you are even a potential voter.  This will not happen in Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, East Granby, or Suffield, but it will in Windsor.

Today the voters are going to have to think long and hard about, whose district they are in.  With the campaign season whose signs are pertinent to them.  This is just more punishment for Windsor.  The House map by Town is available at the following link [http://www.cga.ct.gov/red2011/Documents/2011MAPHOUTOWN/20112011MAP-20111201_Windsor.pdf] and attached to this article.  Residents you may want to start studying.

The Town of Windsor should consider action to put aside this abomination of districting and demand again a singular home grown district as the Town council wanted in January of 2011 and as Connecticut’s oldest Town deserves.

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