The North Carolina Legislature approved the redistricting maps for the state House and state Senate on Thursday, Nov. 4.
Redistricting maps cannot be vetoed by Gov. Roy Cooper, so unless successfully challenged in court, these will be the districts for the next 10 years, beginning with the 2022 elections. The primary for the 2022 elections is March 8, 2022, and filing opens on Dec. 6, 2021, which doesn’t give prospective candidates a whole lot of time to make a decision, particularly those who find themselves in a new district or in the same but radically changed district.
District 59 state Rep. Jon Hardister said that the state House districts in Guilford County were largely the same as they were for 2020 election. Hardister said that District 59 gained a precinct, but otherwise it was the same and he said there were no major changes in any of the state House districts in Guilford County.
However, the same cannot be said for the state Senate districts, which are radically different from what they were for the 2020 election. The northern and eastern parts of Guilford County are now in District 26, which is represented by President Pro Tem of the Senate, Sen. Phil Berger who lives in Eden. The new District 26 goes from the northwest corner of Guilford County to the northeast corner and down to the southeast corner and along the southern border to High Point. It includes most of the county that is not in Greensboro or High Point.
District 27, currently represented by state Sen. Michael Garrett, now includes all of High Point that is in Guilford County, Jamestown and much of northwest Greensboro.
In an earlier version of the map, Garrett had been placed in District 28, which is represented by state Sen. Gladys Robinson. However, a map amendment moved the line to put Garrett back in District 27 so that Garrett and Robinson would not be “double bunked” in District 28. When it looked like Garrett would be in District 28 with Robinson he was quoted as saying he would not run against Robinson, but with the map amendment he doesn’t have to make that decision. Now Garrett can run for reelection in District 27.
In the 2020 maps, District 28 looks like a doughnut hole in the middle of Guilford County and included most of Greensboro. In the new map, District 28 loses the northwest portion of Greensboro to District 27 and expands to the southeast, east and northeast.
