Commissioner districts could be re-balanced

As Kootenai County’s population continues to soar — by more than 20,000 since 2010 — officials are making sure each of the county’s three commissioners’ districts is equally represented.

Under state code, counties must analyze population growth and shifts every two years to make certain there is equal (or close to equal) representation on the board, said Dave Christianson, the county’s geographic information system manager.

“I’ve done the latest analysis and now it’s up to commissioners to see if (the numbers) need to be balanced better,” Christianson said Wednesday.

Under the latest distribution, the districts’ numbers for the three commissioners are fairly close. Here’s a snapshot:

District 1 (Commissioner Bill Brooks)

•Population: 57,060

•Urban population: 40,490 (36%)

•Rural population: 16,579 (33.61%)

District 2 (Commissioner Chris Fillios)

•Population: 51,990

•Urban population: 35,159 (31.26%)

•Rural population: 16,831 (34.12%)

District 3 (Commissioner Leslie Duncan)

•Population: 52,737

•Urban population: 36,824 (32.74%)

•Rural population: 15,913 (32.26%)

Nancy Jones, the county’s communications manager, said the balancing of district populations has no impact on anything other than equal representation. There are no funding ramifications.

“Which is kind of funny since all the commissioners are elected on a countywide basis,” Jones said. “And when somebody calls and says they want to talk to ‘my’ commissioner it really doesn’t matter because all three serve the entire county.”

District boundaries were not changed following the last tally two years ago, Jones said.

After reviewing the latest report from Christianson, the board will decide if slight re-districting is necessary, she said.