Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin soon must eliminate two of council’s 17 seats, setting off a game of political musical chairs before the 2025 elections.
At a Monday news conference, Griffin outlined his plans for redistricting, which will also reshape the boundaries of the remaining 15 wards. A city charter amendment requires council to redraw boundaries after each nationwide census and ties the number of wards to Cleveland’s population.
Griffin said he plans to release a draft map soon. Council will hold four public meetings on the new wards before voting on the map by the end of the year, he said. That would give council members ample time to plan for their futures before the 2025 municipal elections.
More than a decade ago, after the last round of redistricting, the East Side lost a ward. Two East Side incumbents competed for a remaining seat. A West Side council member decided to retire, which helped council cut a ward west of the Cuyahoga River.
It’s still unknown which council members might be pitted against one another in the remaining 15 wards this time around. Also unclear is whether any members would choose to retire from council rather than run against a colleague.
Griffin suggested that members should ask themselves the same questions that he poses to himself: Am I still effective in office? Have I done what I set out to do? Is council the best place for me? What do my constituents want?
“These are tough conversations,” Griffin said, flanked by many of his colleagues. “And I want to say this, and I want to say this in advance: Every single person up here has to look themself in the mirror after every term.”
Council this year inked a $100,000 contract with the team of pollster Bob Dykes, political consultant Kent Whitley and professor Mark Salling to draw the map.
Ward boundaries have official – and unofficial – importance for Cleveland residents. Council members often serve as de facto complaint lines when city services break down. Members also pay for development projects and direct aid with discretionary dollars such as casino funds.
Falling Cleveland population hits East Side hardest
Cleveland – which has fewer than 373,000 people, according to the 2020 census – is not losing population evenly.
Many East Side neighborhoods have seen substantial declines over the last 10 years. Glenville, for instance, has 22% fewer people than it did in 2010. The West Side’s population was generally more stable. Two neighborhoods east of the Cuyahoga River, Downtown and University Circle, saw double-digit percentage growth.
All those numbers mean that largely Black neighborhoods on the East Side are more vulnerable to losing council representation because they’ve lost more population.
On Monday, Griffin did not directly address the political challenge presented by Cleveland’s uneven declines. He offered only a few clues about what a new map might look like.
“We hope to keep neighborhoods intact, more condensed, more equitable in having access to schools, libraries, recreation centers and other resources,” he said, “and to use natural boundaries like rivers, railroads and lakes.”
Only two wards straddle the Cuyahoga River. Ward 3, represented by Kerry McCormack, links downtown with Ohio City and Tremont. Ward 12 connects Slavic Village on the East Side with Old Brooklyn on the West Side.
The comment about rivers was not lost on Rebecca Maurer, who represents Ward 12 but was not at Monday’s news conference.
“I pay attention when people talk about rivers as natural boundaries, because that only affects so many wards,” the council member told Signal Cleveland.
Council’s current map passed in 2013 with four votes in opposition, three of which came from council members on the northeast side of the city. During that round of map-drawing, council leadership faced pressure from the Hispanic Roundtable to draw a West Side ward that included more Latino voters.
