The city redistricting plan must have nearly equal populations in all seven wards and be in the state's hands June 15.
Holyoke City Hall.HOLYOKE – The public spoke, and now city councilors are scrambling.
Councilors will try again Thursday to devise a redistricting plan after residents of a part of Walnut Street Tuesday urged against an existing proposal that would have split their street down the middle.
The Redevelopment Committee will try to vote a recommendation on a redistricting plan at 6 p.m. at City Hall.
The full City Council is scheduled to vote on the redistricting plan on June 7 and the plan is due to the state June 15.
Such a plan is needed to ensure the seven wards have about the same-sized populations after the federal 2010 Census.
Various proposed changes would have residents “moving” to different wards, meaning they would vote at different polling places than they do now.
One of those proposed changes brought Sandra N. Mongeon and neighbors on a Ward 4 part of Walnut Street to a public hearing Tuesday at City Hall.
To ensure population equilibrium in the seven wards, one of the changes would move parts of Ward 4 to Ward 1.
In one case, residents who live on the even-numbered side of part of Walnut Street would go from being part of Ward 4 to Ward 1.
That part of Walnut Street, between Hampshire and Cabot streets, is cohesive, Mongeon said.
Residents talk a lot, their children play together and they attend Ward 4 neighborhood crime watch meetings, she said.
“We are a neighborhood. We feel strongly about staying together as one ward. I understand you have to make some changes. But we are a cohesive neighborhood,” Mongeon said.
“It does make a difference. I feel like I’m settled in and it’s been good,” Walnut Street resident Jacqueline R. Brown-Hazard said.
Committee Chairman Kevin A. Jourdain said councilors were willing to consider changing the proposal. But given the amount of work done on such a complicated plan and with the deadline close, he would support only changes that would move blocks between Wards 4 and 1, not affecting other wards, he said.
Ward 4 Councilor Timothy W. Purington made a proposal the committee will consider Thursday. That proposal would keep three blocks on Walnut Street in Ward 4 while moving four blocks of Ward 4 around Appleton and Beech streets to Ward 1, he said.
The census showed the city’s population to be 39,880. That means each of the seven wards must have between 5,412 and 5,981 people, said Jeffrey F. Burkott, principal planner with the city Office of Planning and Development.