Prison count method gives rural Oregon districts unfair advantage, report says

According to a report released by activists on Wednesday, the state determines where incarcerated Oregonians reside, giving voters in eastern Oregon, Salem, and other primarily rural communities with prisons a bigger voice in the state House than other Oregonians.

According to a report by the Massachusetts-based nonprofit Prison Policy Initiative’s Prison Gerrymandering Project, the state must modify its redistricting procedure prior to the 2030 Census in order to count incarcerated individuals as residing at their most recent address rather than the place where they are currently serving their sentences. In Oregon, those convicted of felonies are not eligible to vote until their sentences are served.

At the expense of almost everyone else in the state, this gives citizens of state legislative districts that house correctional facilities a particularly loud voice in politics, enabling them to have a significant impact on discussions about issues like food stamps, expanding medical release for incarcerated individuals, funding for schools and child care, and more, the report states.

The results come after a federal Census Bureau report from December 2024 that stated states are asking for more assistance with prisoner counting. According to the Wednesday report, almost half of Americans reside in states like California, Montana, Maine, and Pennsylvania where local prison populations are not automatically included for redistricting. This is in contrast to the federal government’s current policy of defining residency, which counts people based on where they live and sleep the majority of the time.

In addition to Oregon’s constitution, which states that incarceration in a public jail does not alter a person’s residency for voting purposes, the authors of the paper cite comparable attempts to modify the counting of detained populations in places like Salem and Pendleton. They claim that the state’s current policies, in particular, dilute the equal representation of Black and Native populations, who are sometimes disproportionately incarcerated, by inflating seven House districts with local prisons.

Rep. Mark Owens, a Republican from Crane, represents the 60th House District, which is the most extreme case. It reaches Deschutes County in central Oregon and much of Oregon’s border with Idaho.

The district’s correctional facilities, which include the Powder River Correctional Facility, Warner Creek Correctional Facility, and Snake River Correctional Facility, house almost 3,800 inmates, or 5.4% of the total population. The investigation found that over half of the Black individuals in his district were incarcerated in nearby facilities. Text messages asking for comment on Wednesday were unanswered by Owens.

According to the report, this indicates that only 95 people in District 60 have the same political influence as 100 people in other districts. The state’s decision to redistrict based on census data that doesn’t accurately reflect where people actually live is what causes this disparity in representation.

Each of Oregon’s House Districts is intended to represent 70,621 people.

This last legislative session, the Prison Policy Initiative backed House Bill 2250, which would have changed Oregon’s redistricting process. According to the measure, each inmate would have had ten months for the Department of Corrections to gather data regarding their previous county of residence.

House Bill 2704, which was submitted in January and instead requested addresses, was a similar bill that was backed by proponents of good government, such as Portland-based Common Cause Oregon. A hearing was never held.

Eugene Democrats Sen. James Manning Jr. and Rep. Lisa Fragala were the primary sponsors of House Bill 2250. In front of the House Rules Committee in March, they contended that the plan would not change the way towns receive funds, but rather give officials a more precise count so they can comprehend district composition and guarantee fair representation. Fragala told the Capital Chronicle that after determining which parts of the measure required more improvement, she intended to attempt to resubmit it in a later session.

In a written comment regarding the study, Fragala stated that these districts do not meet the state’s redistricting requirements. Oregon would be one step closer to implementing the constitutional principles of equal representation if it changed the way incarcerated people are counted in the statistics used for redistricting.

Text messages asking for comment were not answered by Manning.

After the hearing, in which Republicans questioned the bill’s effect on the redistricting process and the exclusion of other mobile populations like college students, the pair’s measure failed to go past the House Rules Committee.

The present counting process is said to benefit Rep. Lucetta Elmer, R-McMinnville, whose 24th House District includes Polk and Yamhill counties.

Adding that local governments’ representation of the prison population in her district draws attention to the burden that her district’s Federal Corrections Institute in Sheridan places on local emergency services, Elmer stated that she would be more inclined to support a more comprehensive strategy that incorporates more mobile populations.

It’s not as though their last known address is being falsified. According to her, they frequently haven’t been there for years and years and years. I suppose I’m failing to see that connection.

According to the story, Elmer wasn’t the only Republican with similar opinions. Salem Republican State Representative Kevin Mannix told the Capital Chronicle that he didn’t see any problems with the state’s existing strategy.

Mannix, who represents the 21st House District in north Salem, stated that we count individuals where they live. And that’s the case if they live in a correctional facility.

Given the bill’s failure, the report recommends that the state proceed with the legislation, pointing out that Oregon has the advantage of honing its strategy by learning from the prior legislation.

Rep. Sue Rieke Smith, D-King City, was the only Democrat whose district was included among the top ones in the report. She pointed to her predecessor, Sen. Courtney Neron Misslin, D-Wilsonville, as one of the measure’s 11 Democratic sponsors, indicating that she would probably support a bill similar to the one heard in March, even though she was appointed to the Legislature to fill a seat in June.

As a public worker, she stated that everything that affects the humanity of people in this state should either be removed by the government or support the elimination of obstacles for them, especially if it is clearly stated in our state constitution.

A distinct perspective was held by Rep. Ed Diehl, R-Stayton, whose 17th House District in the Santiam Canyon was also included in the study.

“I was shocked to learn that I have a lot of power and influence in the Legislature because of this prison population,” he said. I would have tried to use it if someone had told me that beforehand.

— Oregon Capital Chronicle’s Shaanth Kodialam Nanguneri

The largest state-focused nonprofit news agency in the country, States Newsroom, includes Oregon Capital Chronicle.