Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin released proposed maps redrawing ward boundaries on Tuesday afternoon that eliminated two of its 17 seats.
“Bottom line, ladies and gentlemen, two wards had to disappear because the population declined," Griffin said during a press conference Tuesday. "We all — including me — had to give up some areas we cherished and gain new areas.”
Voters approved a charter amendment in 2008 that requires the number of wards to be reassessed every decade based on Census data. This time, city council must ax two seats due to population loss. Council has lost six seats since that change.
Griffin had previously said he wanted new wards to keep neighborhoods together and use natural boundaries. He said Tuesday that goal was imperfectly achieved and was not entirely possible because of continually changing neighborhood boundaries and ward population requirements outlined in the charter.
"This is a very difficult process," he said, "a lot of sacrifice, but a lot of opportunity."
Each ward had to have more than 23,600 residents and less than 26,084, according to Griffin. The average map-makers aimed for was 24,800, however, there is an inequitable split between the city's East and West Side: Most of the population loss between 2010 and 2020 occurred on the city's northeast and southeast sides, while neighborhoods on the more densely populated West Side remained stable or grew.
Griffin said there were other considerations too. He wanted to avoid pitting incumbent city council members against each other, especially women, he said, stressing the council values its five female members.
Loss of wards sparks controversy among members
Councilmember Rebecca Maurer, whose Ward 12 will become a casualty if the new maps are approved, is raising concerns about how council leadership determined which wards to cut.
"The charter puts the council leadership and council members in a tough position where we're charged with drawing our own maps, which is... odd to begin with, but was something that I was hopeful to see through because everyone in on council was talking about natural boundaries and keeping neighborhoods together," Maurer told Ideastream Tuesday. "So it was really shocking to me to see the first iteration of the maps... it really raised concerns for me about the fundamental fairness of what was going on."
Under the proposed maps, Ward 12, which currently includes parts of Old Brooklyn, Slavic Village, Brooklyn Centre and Tremont, will be diced into six pieces.
Maurer, who ousted long-time Cleveland Councilmember Anthony Brancatelli in 2021, has periodically butted heads with city council leadership in her first term: something she said may have made her ward a target for elimination in the redistricting process.
"I am concerned that there's sort of a 'you line up or you're drawn out' approach to this mapmaking process," Maurer said.
Griffin said any ward changes were out of necessity, not animus.
“It was strictly about numbers,” he said. “This is not about advocating for any individual council member.”
Griffin said he stayed away from the early drafting process and only became involved when council members began providing feedback.
The discord surrounding redistricting has been detrimental, he said.
“False accusations, misinformation and disinformation has been dangerous to this process,” said Griffin.
The conflict over the proposed maps has been heating up for weeks.
Maurer said Griffin presented council members a version of the maps last month in a closed-door meeting where she said she expressed concern about the proposed boundary changes to Ward 12.
She said her Slavic Village home was denoted on the map and had been absorbed into a district that most resembles the current Ward 3, which includes Ohio City, most of Downtown and Tremont and part of the Stockyard area.
Griffin said some changes were made after that initial presentation to accommodate some council members' concerns.
In a Nov. 25 speech on the floor of City Council chambers, Maurer accused Griffin of gerrymandering, a process in which politicians manipulate boundaries for their own political gain.
Griffin rebuffed the comment in a fiery response at the same meeting, defending the process as "fair and transparent." He said some council members had approached him with concerns that Maurer was not a "team player" and that they did not trust her.
Those comments are evidence that she is being pushed out, Maurer said, adding she is not the only council member with concerns about the process. She did not name others who agreed with her.
Members of the public have been asking to see the maps
Despite the controversy and in-fighting, Griffin maintains the process was above board. Council worked with an independent consultant team on the maps, and Griffin hosted multiple public input sessions in October ahead of the maps' release.
Griffin, who was not on council during the last redistricting process, said public feedback was important to him, but he also had to juggle population, demographic and geographic stipulations laid out by the charter.
Councilmember Mike Polensek, who has served on council more than 40 years, lauded Griffin on the council floor for his efforts, which he said were more transparent than decades past.
Even still, some members of the public disagreed, flooding recent public comment periods to demand that the proposed maps be released sooner to give the public more time to respond before council voted. The maps were not presented at council's public listening sessions.
Patrick Britton, a 43-year-old Ward 12 resident, was among those critics at a recent council meeting.
"I think that the council members know that this is not the right process and that they know that there's a community engagement process they should be engaged in and they will use whatever excuse they feel is most appropriate to not have to do those things," Britton told Ideastream.
What's next?
Council will next send the map to the city's Office of Capital Projects to create legal descriptions of the new wards. They plan to vote on the new boundaries at the Jan. 6 council meeting.
That is the first council meeting after the December break, which means the public will have one in-person public comment period to voice their opinions before council votes. The public may also submit comments by calling 216-714-3006, emailing maps@clevelandcitycouncil.org or by visiting www.clevelandcitycouncil.org/resources/public-comment.
The maps will be used in the May primary and go into effect in January 2026.
All council seats are up for re-election in 2025.
Maurer said it's "unclear" what her future plans are, but she is not ruling out running another council campaign next fall.
"What I know is that I have a lot of fight left to give to the city of Cleveland and to the neighborhoods of Ward 12," she said. "I don't know what that role will look like or what it means for me, but I know I have a lot of fight left to give."
