New York State Independent Redistricting Commission

Megan
February 11, 2023
Dear IRC Commissioners, My name is Megan and I live in the town of Germantown in Columbia County. I was pleased to see that most of Columbia County will finally be in one Assembly District, the new AD107. But I object to the exclusion of the towns of Ancram and Gallatin from this new Assembly District 107. Ancram and Gallatin are part of Columbia County, which is in the Capitol District state agency region, while Dutchess is part of the Mid-Hudson Valley state agency region. Ancram and Gallatin and their approximately 3600 voters should be kept with the rest of Columbia County, rather than split off from their county and put in an AD that is focused on Dutchess County. Placing them in your proposed AD106 disadvantages them in terms of potential economic resources that might be made available them from NYS. It also separates them from their strongest communities of interest, which are the communities in your proposed AD107. I urge you to reincorporate Ancram and Gallatin with Columbia County into AD107. This can be done with only minor changes to what you have proposed for AD107. Here is a link to a sample map that does this: https://districtr.org/plan/167579 (You can export this map shown in this link into various cartographic file types.) Thank you, Megan C. Clermont (Columbia County) New York new Assembly District 107.

Lyma
February 11, 2023
Attention: Submissions Independent Redistricting Commission 250 Broadway, 22nd Floor New York, nY 10007 I belong to the 41st Assembly District Community. It was very confusing last year when redistricting took place and do not want more changes again. The changes caused my neighbors to come to the wrong polling sites and choose not to vote sometimes. I am a Poll Worker and this would affect my Poll worker ability to work for the future. Lyma Mack

Bobbie
February 11, 2023
Attention: Submissions Independent Redistricting Commission 250 Broadway, 22nd Floor New York, NY 1007 I belong to the 41st Assembly District Community and would like to continue my relationship with the elected officials near my house. It was very confusing last year when redistricting took place and do not want more changes again only two years later. I am a Poll Worker providing ballot access at poll sites within the 41st A.D. Bobbie Mack

Shana
February 11, 2023
Dear Chair and Commissioners: I am a resident of Greenpoint and I am writing to express my concern over the newest IRC map that divides our community in half. The newest proposed AD50 encompasses the western half of Greenpoint and Williamsburg, while the eastern half of our community is becoming part of AD38. The split of AD50 along McGuinness Boulevard and lower along Driggs Avenue will also divide a community that has successfully faced environmental challenges threatening our neighborhood. This includes the designation of two federal superfund sites, the building of at least three power plants, and flood resiliency planning. The separation of North Brooklyn is a direct threat to organizers and community members who have worked together to accomplish important climate resiliency, mitigation, and clean-up projects and ensure city/state funding for this work. The split of North Brooklyn denies us the ability to function as one community and places neighbors at odds with respect to funding for various programs including education, mass transit, economic development, infrastructure repairs and environmental remediation. The proposed maps create an untenable situation for those neighbors who will be moved into AD38, a small but important part of the community, who have a long history in protecting our neighborhood’s transition to residential from industrial. Our neighbors will face a tremendous environmental burden if the current maps move forward. We request for the community of Greenpoint to be kept whole, so we can better coordinate with city agencies and our representatives on the provision of services. Our community has been and must continue to work together to achieve these needs and to preserve our neighborhoods and support its residents. Thank you, Shana Kimball

Jennifer
February 11, 2023
Hi - I’m a current resident within Assembly District 44. My address falls within the area that’s bring proposed for redistricting from this district to Assembly District 51 - Red Hook and Sunset Park instead. We have been part of this closely connected community for decades, share similar goals and concerns, and are clearly much more geographically aligned to AD 44 than to AD 51, who does not share the unique concerns or priorities for my neighborhood. This proposal makes no sense and would essentially leave me and my fellow neighbors affected by this redistricting as an outlier, an afterthought, swallowed up and voiceless within AD 51. We are already active and civically engaged in the concerns within AD 44 already. I strongly disagree with the proposed change and if it is approved would not represent our needs and wishes and be harmful to myself, my neighbored and the CD 44 community as a whole. Thank you.

Laura
February 11, 2023
I understand that the Independent Redistricting Commission is meeting on February 15, 2023, at Medgar Evers College, to consider proposed Assembly districts affecting my Brooklyn neighborhood, Bay Ridge. It has been brought to my attention that the current proposed lines will divide Bay Ridge into 4 different Assembly districts -- for reasons I cannot fathom. Your proposed districts are not only a disservice to Bay Ridge, they are manifestly unjust. My neighborhood, Bay Ridge, is a Democratic neighborhood with Democratic presidential candidates winning about 60% of the vote. Its representatives in the City Council, the State Assembly, the State Senate, and even Congress at one point, have been Democrats. Bay Ridge deserves to be recognized as a Democratic district rather than having its political history and political reality ignored by proposed lines whose reasoning and purpose are not clear to me. I would request you to redraw your proposed lines so that Bay Ridge would constitute one single Assembly district, or at least not more than two. Continuing the connection between Bay Ridge and Coney Island also makes sense given the newly drawn City Council district. Laura Lopez 303 99th Street Brooklyn, NY 11209

Tom
February 11, 2023
To Whom it May Concern, I am unable to attend the public hearing this week due to my work schedule, but I am reaching out to express my dismay with the proposed redistricting. My family and I were upset to see the proposed redistricting of our neighborhood. We live on the corner of Fort. Hamilton Parkway & E. 3rd Streets in Kensington-Windsor Terrace and see that the Commission is proposing to cut off the 44th AD using the Prospect Expressway as a dividing line. Anyone who has spent any time at all in our area would understand that this simply doesn't make sense! The area West of the Expressway is very much part of the area to the East-- our children attend schools together on both sides of the Expressway. We cross this border regularly to shop, dine, visit. Our closest subway stop, the Ft. Hamilton F/G, has exits on either side of the Expressway, so this redistricting would split that single subway station in half!! In short, in every sense of the word, this area is a united neighborhood and we share the same concerns and issues. The 51st AD, a vibrant district located to the West containing Sunset Park and Red Hook, is on the other side of Green-Wood Cemetery and is very much a distinct neighborhood from ours. The Cemetery creates a very real boundary of hundreds of acres-- one that can not be easily crossed. (It is quite literally closed to the public after dark.) We in our neighborhood fear that if we were redistricted into the 51st AD, our tiny sliver of a neighborhood would be an afterthought. I am respectfully asking the Commission to restore Green-Wood Cemetery along 20th Street to be the Western border of the 44th AD, not the Prospect Expressway as in the draft plan, and Green-Wood Cemetery along McDonald Avenue and Fort Hamilton Parkway out to 39th Street as the Northern boundary between the 44th and 51st ADs. This is a shift of only a few blocks but makes complete sense geographically. Without this change the portions of Kensington and Windsor Terrace cut out of the 44th AD will be a small afterthought in the 51st AD divided from that district by the hundreds of acres of Green-Wood Cemetery. I hope that the Commission will consider visiting our sliver of a neighborhood. I know you will quickly understand that this proposed new map needs to be adjusted. Thank you for your consideration.

Lana
February 11, 2023
I strongly, strongly believe that Greenpoint should be kept whole as a district and I am extremely opposed to siphoning off the neighborhood the way these plans propose.

Orville
February 11, 2023
Hello, I’m opposed to the redistricting of our Windsor Terrace neighborhood to take us out of the 44th assembly district to be part of the Sunset Park. We will be the outlier of small community that won't align with Sunset Park commiunity.. We are one community connected by schools, houses of worship, mass transit and parks. The Commission marginalizes citizens and weakens their voice by spreading citizens among several representatives. Keep the neighborhoods of the 44th Assembly District intact as they currently exist and have for over 30 years. Please reconsider your decision. Regards, Orville Kiser

Dawn
February 11, 2023
It will hinder our needs as resident of windsor terrace to be split off from the rest of our community. All of out traffic concerns and participation with our community relies on us being connected to Windsor terrace and park slope. I oppose the redistricting proposal to remove a huge section of Windsor terrace, park slope and ditmas from our current 44th assembly district. It is essential for us to maintain a voice in the areas we live in and interact with. It makes no sense to be lumped into sunset park which has a whole different set of needs than our current community. We should not be chipped away. I disagree with this proposal as our voices for where we live and support local businesses will no longer be heard if we are taken out of our current district. I do not support this proposal.

Meema
February 11, 2023
To Whom it May Concern, I am unable to attend the public hearing this week due to my work schedule, but I am reaching out to express my dismay with the proposed redistricting. My family and I were upset to see the proposed redistricting of our neighborhood. We live on Ft. Hamilton Parkway between E. 4th & E. 3rd Streets in Kensington-Windsor Terrace and see that the Commission is proposing to cut off the 44th AD using the Prospect Expressway as a dividing line. Anyone who has spent any time at all in our area would understand that this simply doesn't make sense! The area West of the Expressway is very much part of the area to the East-- our children attend schools together on both sides of the Expressway; we worship at churches, synagogues and mosques together; we cross this border regularly to shop, dine, visit. Our closest subway stop, the Ft. Hamilton F/G, has exits on either side of the Expressway, so this redistricting would split that single subway station in half!! In short, in every sense of the word, this area is a united neighborhood and we share the same concerns and issues. The 51st AD, a vibrant district located to the West containing Sunset Park and Red Hook, is on the other side of Green-Wood Cemetery and is very much a distinct neighborhood from ours. The Cemetery creates a very real boundary of hundreds of acres-- one that can not be easily crossed. (It is quite literally closed to the public after dark.) We in our neighborhood fear that if we were redistricted into the 51st AD, our tiny sliver of a neighborhood would be an afterthought. I am respectfully asking the Commission to restore Green-Wood Cemetery along 20th Street to be the Western border of the 44th AD, not the Prospect Expressway as in the draft plan, and Green-Wood Cemetery along McDonald Avenue and Fort Hamilton Parkway out to 39th Street as the Northern boundary between the 44th and 51st ADs. This is a shift of only a few blocks but makes complete sense geographically. Without this change the portions of Kensington and Windsor Terrace cut out of the 44th AD will be a small afterthought in the 51st AD divided from that district by the hundreds of acres of Green-Wood Cemetery. I hope that the Commission will consider visiting our sliver of a neighborhood. I know you will quickly understand that this proposed new map needs to be adjusted. Thank you for your consideration. Sincerely, Meema Spadola meema.spadola@gmail.com

Katherine
February 11, 2023
As a resident of Windsor Terrace, I am asking that you not move forward with the changes to the 44th Assembly District. Park Slope, Windsor Terrace and Kensington are connected by trains, schools (and school districts) and neighborhood ties and businesses. Changing the district lines would be destructive to all of these established components of a functioning community. We are separated from Sunset Park by one of the largest "park" areas in Brooklyn -- Greenwood Cemetery. The proposed lines cut our Windsor Terrace neighborhood in half along a parkway many of the neighborhood streets cross, and which is regularly crossed by residents for schooling, entertainments and community relationships. This is a terrible plan. Please address and correct.

Marina
February 11, 2023
Don’t divide Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, and Kensington. We are one community connected by schools, houses of worship, mass transit and parks. Keep the neighborhoods of the 44th Assembly District intact as they currently exist and have for over 30 years

Joy
February 10, 2023
Please do not cut Kensington and Windsor Terrace into pieces. This plan will put a handful of blocks of Kensington and a handful of blocks of Windsor Terrace into a different Assembly District than the rest of those two neighborhoods. We'll be put into an AD where our voices will be too weak to be heard because we'll be a very small part of it. In the new AD, we'll be physically separated from the rest of it by Green-Wood Cemetery, the second largest cemetery in the country. We might as well get put on another planet.

Diana
February 10, 2023
To IRC Members of the Commission: My comments focuses on your plan for the 44th Assembly District and specifically your decision to place portions of the neighborhoods of Windsor Terrace and Kensington in two different Assembly Districts, the 44th and the 51st. We believe both neighborhoods should be wholly within the 44th AD as they have been historically. Your decision to put portions of both Windsor Terrace and Kensington into different Assembly Districts makes both impacted ADs less compact and contiguous and also divides two long established and discrete communities with common interests, demographics and a history of positive civic activism. Simply stated it is contrary to many of the bedrock principles which should guide fair redistricting and good government. Specifically, we ask that you make Greenwood Cemetery along 20th Street the western border of the 44th AD not the Prospect Expressway as in the draft plan, and Greenwood Cemetery along McDonald Avenue and Fort Hamilton Parkway out to 39th Street the Northern boundary between the 44th and 51st ADs. This is a shift of only a few blocks but makes complete sense geographically. Without this change the portions of Kensington and Windsor Terrace cut out of the 44th AD will be a small afterthought in the 51st AD divided from that district by the hundreds of acres of Greenwood Cemetery. The 51st AD contains the entirety of the thriving neighborhood of Sunset Park and that neighborhood historically dominates that district. The inevitable result of the draft plan is that the few blocks of Windsor Terrace and Kensington attached to the vast bulk of Sunset Park will be underserved. This is entirely unfair to those residents of south Windsor Terrace/North Kensington who live miles away from Sunset Park, yet would be placed in its new 51st AD. Thank you for your consideration. Diana

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