Kansas City City Council votes down attempt to maintain current Northland district lines
An attempt by Northland city council members to maintain current district borders that divide the Northland from north to south has failed.
In the latest chapter of a contentious redistricting process, the Kansas City City Council voted Thursday to move forward with a map recommended by the Kansas City Redistricting Commission and the Special Committee for Legal Review, which draws a horizontal line through the Northland.
The four Northland council members — Heather Hall, Kevin O’Neill, Teresa Loar, and Dan Fowler — voiced strong opposition to the proposal prior to Thursday’s 3 p.m. council meeting. All voted Thursday in favor of an attempt to amend the map to maintain the vertical divide, but lost in a 7-6 vote.
The final vote on the map recommended by the commission passed 9-4, with all Northland council members opposing. This decision drastically changes the makeups of District 1 and District 2, which will now be divided at Barry Road.
Supporters of the change have said the horizontal divide would give more voice to poor and working class community members. Those who opposed it said they worried about a more divided north.
Every 10 years the lines are redrawn to put Kansas Citians into one of six council districts. The process is based on population changes in the latest Census and law requires that maps be drawn so that districts are as close to equal in population as possible.
Census data released in August showed Kansas City’s population climbed to an all-time high of more than 508,000 residents, up 11% from 2010.
While other district boundaries were also altered, none of the changes were as dramatic or garnered as much attention as the Northland map.
Ed Ford, a former City Council member from north of the river who now serves as chair of the Northland Regional Chamber of Commerce, said he had been cautiously optimistic about Thursday’s vote. But he came out disappointed.
“It’s going to be hard for the Northland to support the city since the city’s not supporting the Northland,” Ford said following the vote.
Mayor Quinton Lucas, who voted against the attempt to amend the map to include a vertical divide, said the decision was made with current and future Kansas Citians in mind.
“I know change sometimes is tough,” Lucas said after the vote.
“We are all mature people, we’re grownups. You come back the next day. You do what’s best for the people of Kansas City.
On Thursday, the first seven rows on one side of the council chambers were filled with people in support of the vertical divide. Many held signs that read: “connect, don’t divide.”
Councilman Kevin O’Neill had offered to bus people from the Northland to Thursday’s council meeting.
In recent months, the redistricting commission received more than 200 comments from the community, including more than 50 public comments in favor of keeping the vertical split and more than 30 in favor of a horizontal split.
After a lengthy committee hearing in November, the group recommended redrawing the line horizontally with a 6-3 vote. Two of the three Northland representatives, as well as a District 6 representative, voted against the change.
Hall, who presented historic budget numbers to the council Thursday, said she believes Northland council members have been “more than equittable” in how they distributed funds, funneling the majority of the money in recent years to projects and neighborhoods south of Barry Road.
She’s concerned that now, those in the most economically distressed parts of the Northland closer to the river will recieve fewer financial resources.
Lucas in response told reporters he believes the revised map is fair. He, and others, have said one of the commission’s goals was to get more and new voices represented in every part of the city.
“Look, I love every part of the city the same,” he said. “I think we have a growing, vibrant city and I think the redistricting committee balanced that as they did their work.”
This story was originally published December 16, 2021 at 5:00 PM.
