political districting

Political districting to maximize whole counties

  • Maral Shahmizad
  • Austin Buchanan
    • Categories Applications - OR and Management Sciences, Combinatorial Optimization, Integer Programming Tags , , ,

    We consider a fundamental question in political districting: How many counties can be kept whole (i.e., not split across multiple districts), while satisfying basic criteria like contiguity and population balance? To answer this question, we propose integer programming techniques based on combinatorial Benders decomposition. The main problem decides which counties to keep whole, and the … Read more

    A widespread belief about county splits in political districting plans is wrong

  • Austin Buchanan
  • Soraya Ezazipour
  • Maral Shahmizad
    • Categories Applications - OR and Management Sciences, Combinatorial Optimization, Integer Programming Tags , ,

    Consider the task of dividing a state into k contiguous political districts whose populations must not differ by more than one person, following current practice for congressional districting in the USA. A widely held belief among districting experts is that this task requires at least k-1 county splits. This statement has appeared in expert testimony, … Read more