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Advisory committee reviews mapping platform, submission rules and deadlines for Orange County redistricting
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Summary
County staff and the vendor set out the Redistricting tool, training, data sources and submission rules; members and public raised questions about vendor oversight, data choice (2020 Census vs. ACS) and privacy.
Orange County’s Mid Decennial Redistricting Advisory Committee on March 12 reviewed the mapping tools and submission procedures the county will use as it redraws commission districts from six to eight.
County GIS staff said ArcBridge set up the Dave’s Redistricting application as the platform committee members and the public will use to draw plans, and explained account setup, publishing, exporting shapefiles and the map-submittal form the county will require. Pete Johnstone, who described himself as working in Orange County’s GIS section, said, “In order to make a plan, you have to sign up for an account that will require an e‑mail and password. Then you’ll have to agree to their terms.”
The vendor will analyze submitted maps for things such as maximum population deviation and communities of interest and provide a report to the committee; the vendor will not alter submitted plans, Johnstone said. County staff asked submitters to include a map name, a shapefile export and a submission form so vendor and legal review can proceed. The committee was given a final submission deadline of 11:59 p.m. Eastern on July 3, 2025; maps submitted by that date will be analyzed and placed on the July 30, 2025 agenda for review.
Why it matters: the software and rules define how residents and committee members create and formally submit proposed district maps. The platform choice affects public access, privacy and the county’s ability to validate and publish candidate plans.
Key technical and procedural points
- The county will base plans on 2020 Census blocks in the vendor configuration, and the Dave’s Redistricting instance provided to the county is set up with 2020 Census data.
- To work on a plan users duplicate a base plan in their account; they may publish plans publicly (visible to other Dave’s users) or export a shapefile and complete the county submittal form to submit formally for committee review.
- Submitted maps will receive a vendor analysis and a legal review. County Attorney White told the committee, “The vendor will be forwarding all maps to me for legal review, and I will be performing a manual review on each map.”
- Training sessions with the vendor are scheduled in person at the Administration Building: an initial public training (noted during the meeting) and hands-on sessions March 25 and March 26 from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.; additional virtual sessions will be available by appointment.
Questions and concerns from members and the public
Committee members and members of the public raised questions about vendor oversight, public access, and whether the county’s instance of Dave’s Redistricting is a proprietary vendor product. Member Washington and others said they were surprised the public first heard about the platform at the meeting. County staff said the county contracted ArcBridge to manage the redistricting process and set up the Dave’s Redistricting environment for committee and public use; ArcBridge also offers its own commercial tools.
Citizen Jim Callahan warned users not to download Dave’s Redistricting software to personal computers and advised using the online service only. Callahan said, “Do not download Dave’s to your personal computer. Like every other software, it has cookies and algorithms.”
Legal and data limits
Attorney White reiterated legal constraints the committee must follow, including population-equality principles: “The maximum deviation between population cannot exceed 10%,” White said, when asked about acceptable deviation levels for submitted maps. Staff emphasized that while other data sets (for example, American Community Survey estimates or local growth estimates) are available as reference material, “the most reliable data that we have is the decennial census data,” and the vendor instance will be configured with 2020 Census blocks.
What comes next
Staff and the vendor will analyze submitted plans and provide committee reports. County staff asked map sponsors to use clear plan names and versioning (for example, author name + version), and suggested committee-endorsed plans receive an official committee name when accepted for consideration. The vendor and county will present analyses at subsequent meetings for committee discussion.
