Census May Prompt Redrawing of Kent's Ward Boundaries

The boundaries of Kent's six wards may change this year as city officials examine the 2010 Census data and the population of the city's neighborhoods.

A requirement in Kent's charter calls for examining the population of the city's six wards every 10 years, based on Census data. The charter calls for apportioning each ward equally, and redrawing boundaries if necessary, "so that there is no disparity in resident population of more than 10 percent between wards," according to the charter.

Last week, showed the city gained 998 new residents in the past decade. The question now is in which of the city's six wards are those new residents living, and if ward lines need to be redrawn to maintain that 10 percent balance mandated by the charter.

“I don’t look for too much of a change," Kent Mayor Jerry Fiala said. "It isn’t that it’s a real big impact."

Director Gary Locke said the data anaylysis very well may show the ward populations have not changed beyond the 10 percent apportionment rule in the charter.

“If the new data shows that the wards are not within the balance that's required by the charter, then we’d see where the differences are," he said. "If it looks like we might make some minor adjustments, then we’ll put together a new (ward) map and take it to council.”

Locke said the city made a few insignificant changes to the ward boundaries after the 2000 Census. But the 1990 Census caused some fairly significant changes in the ward boundaries.

"If you look at the city kind of as a scale, east side versus west side, after the 1990 Census the population on the east side of the city was larger," Locke said. "And the population on the west side of the city wasn’t in balance. So a lot of the wards, Ward 3 especially, had to be balanced out.”

Several of the ward boundaries were moved to the east to pick up more residents and maintain the 10 percent apportionment balance.

Most residents won't notice the change unless redrawing the lines changes voting districts.

If that's the case, it's a slight inconvenience Fiala is willing to accept when comparing Kent's population to other Northeast Ohio communities.

"I think the city’s real lucky that we’re gaining and not like Cleveland and losing," Fiala said. "I look at it as a positive thing, because that means our city is growing. It’s good for Kent. Economically it’s good. Obviously part of that percentage of the new growth is houses, and it’s making people aware there is something good here in Kent to stay here.”