In June of 2023, Common Cause Indiana, the League of Women Voters of Indiana, and the Anderson-Madison County branch of the NAACP filed a lawsuit in federal court to force Anderson, Indiana to redraw its badly malapportioned city council districts.  

On September 30, 2024, a federal judge ruled that the Anderson City Council’s failure to redistrict with recent census data violates the U.S. Constitution and that fair maps must be drawn. Before Monday’s ruling, Anderson had not properly redistricted in more than four decades. The Council last redrew its voting map in 1982 and ignored population changes identified in the 1990, 2000, 2010, and 2020 decennial census counts. The City Council has cost taxpayers over $150,000 in legal costs to defend blatantly unconstitutional districts. 

The ruling awarded summary judgment to the plaintiffs and struck down districts with differences in population far beyond what is allowed under the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection. The Court relied largely on the statistical analysis done by Sarah Andre, Common Cause’s Redistricting Demography and Mapping Specialist. The opinion concluded that the Anderson districts, with a population deviation of 45.48%, were unconstitutionally malapportioned. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a deviation of more than 10% is presumably unconstitutional unless justified by the government defendants. 

Although the Court declined to issue an injunction, citing potential voter confusion during the 2024 elections, Anderson City Council elections will not take place until 2027. The City Council must now redraw the map. 

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