'A mockery of our public hearings': Augusta redistricting committee selects map many residents opposed

Augusta’s redistricting committee threw out three new draft maps Monday, voting to end the process and return to a first map drawn by the state reapportionment office.

The chosen map, referred to as the "minimal change draft," drew heated opposition at four public hearings and in submitted comments, but several committee members said Monday it was preferable.

The map moves large parts of Summerville and Forest Hills, two historic residential areas sometimes termed the "Hill," from District 3 into District 2, to compensate for growth around Fort Gordon.

Most vocally supportive of the plan Monday was Commissioner Alvin Mason, whose interim commission District 4 gained new neighborhoods in the newer, discarded drafts. The map will be used for May commission elections.

“Nobody’s physical location is moving anywhere,” he said. “Your representation may change. We don’t really need to, in my opinion, get strung out. Not one set of constituents is more important… In this draft map, we’re all going to lose something, but we’re also going to gain something.”

School system trustee Venus Cain said residents in her area are still suffering from the current map, which divided some communities. The map was drawn by a federal judge using the state reapportionment office to craft it, in 2012 after local and state officials failed to agree on one. 

“Nobody in District 3 wants to move, but 10 years ago you chopped, you cut, you diced districts 4 and 5 and we have lived with it for over 10 years,” Cain said.

“Let’s be fair across the board – it’s somebody else’s turn now,” followed Mason, who chaired the redistricting committee 10 years ago and has been critical of the existing map. In the rejected drafts, city staff were asked to preserve or reunite neighborhoods.

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The vote was 6-3 with Commissioner Sean Frantom and school system trustees Helen Minchew and Jimmy Atkins opposed. Three committee members, state reps. Brian Prince, Mark Newton and Wayne Howard, were absent.

Despite his opposition, Frantom, who chairs the 12-member committee, commented favorably earlier Monday about the minimal change draft. He called it “the most balanced map that we got” and “probably the best avenue.” He later encouraged the committee to resume working on a map.

Atkins said if he’d known the committee would take this route, he “would have declined” serving on it.

“We’ve wasted a lot of people’s time,” Atkins said. “We have the ability to listen to the citizens that elect us to help draw these maps. The biggest group that we heard from was Summerville and Forest Hills, and we’re not even thinking about putting them back together.”

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Minchew said the decision “makes a mockery of our public hearings. To say we’re not going to give them any consideration, I just have a big problem with that.”

Commissioner Catherine Smith McKnight, whose District 3 faces the most cuts because it grew the most, said the committee’s decision was disappointing.

“It’s a disappointment to me – you go through all this, you get the citizens of Richmond County to come out, and then you go back to square one,” she said. “This is just spinning wheels going nowhere.”

David Dunagan, who has spoken out on behalf of the Summerville Neighborhood Association, said all the effort so far, including the public hearings, “was a waste of time.”

“There was an opportunity to put lots of neighborhoods back together included but not limited to Pepperidge, Woodlake and Summerville. But instead of trying to work through the process as the committee chairman recommended, they just took the easy way out and voted to accept the state’s recommendation,” he said.