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The Lauderdale County Board of Supervisors on Monday finalized its supervisor, justice court and constable district maps after redistricting based on the 2020 census.

Parker Berry of Butler Snow LLP, a law-firm which was contracted to help the county’s redistricting effort, said the board’s approval marked the end of the supervisors’ involvement in the redistricting process.

“We are end of the road finally, for your redistricting,” he said.

Throughout the redistricting process, Berry said Butler Snow worked to incorporate feedback from county officials, along with statements made at the August 22 public hearing, to draw district lines that followed the applicable laws. Each district, he said, had to be within 5% of the ideal district size of 14,387, and the county’s total deviation was required to be under 10%.

The proposed maps presented at the public hearing reduced the supervisor district maps from 17.34% to 2.64%, Berry said. However, District 33 Sen. Jeff Tate, who chairs the Senate Elections Committee and is a former elections commissioner, requested a change to avoid a split precinct during the public hearing.

“We looked into that, and we were able to make that particular change,” he said.

Supervisor Joe Norwood had also requested a change to avoid a split precinct, and Butler Snow was able to make that one as well Berry said. With the changes, he said, the supervisor districts had a final deviation of 7.42%,

District 3 will be the smallest district, with a deviation of 4.24% under the ideal population size, Berry said, and District 1 will be the largest at 3.18% over the ideal size.

Similarly to supervisor districts, Berry said the district maps for justice court and constables were also drawn using feedback, census data and making sure the districts complied with the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution.

“This next board order is for the justice court and constables,” he said. “Same process, same factors, same public hearing we had on the 22nd.”

Under the new maps, Berry said the justice court and constable districts have a total deviation of 5.2%.

Supervisor Jonathan Wells said the next step is for Butler Snow to begin working with Lauderdale County Circuit Clerk Donna Jill Johnson to decide where voting precincts need to be located.

“The circuit clerk will take that information and start putting it together to notify the citizens if things have changed in their area,” he said.

Berry said cartographers with Butler Snow had already reached out the circuit clerk’s office to begin work on the precinct locations. With most county officials up for election next year, he said the goal was to have precincts placed and voters notified of any changes before candidates begin qualifying next year.

Wells said the board of supervisors wanted to finalize the maps to give the circuit clerk as much time as possible to notify voters prior the the maps going into effect January 1.

“It goes into effect the first of the year, so you want to give her plenty of time to get all that stuff together and let our citizens be notified,” he said.

As the November 8 general election draws near, Wells stressed that the action taken Monday would not go into effect until 2023. No redistricting or changes to voting precincts will impact the November election, he said.

“All this stuff that we did today will not affect the November election,” he said. “All that will go into effect in January.”