User Guide

Districts Communities

Getting Started with Communities

On the Districtr homepage, click “Jump to the Map” in the top right corner.
You will be redirected to an interactive map of the United States. Click the state for which you wish to make a districting plan. All states are available, as well as Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico.

On the homepage, we click Jump To The Map, select a state and enter its portal

Once you have selected a state, you will be directed to its landing page, which contains all mapping options along with background information. Click on “Communities” at the top to activate Communities options, which are in red.
Choose a locality and unit type by clicking on a red card. (Additional localities can be added upon request.)
You will now be redirected to your selected districting page.

To enter communities map editor from a state portal, we select Draw Community and select an Identify Community option.

Main Tools

Moving across the map

Select the hand icon in the top right corner of the page. Then click and drag to pan across the map.
To zoom in and out, use the plus and minus buttons in the top left corner of the map. You can also use a mouse scroll wheel or trackpad.
Type in a street address, place name, town, or zip code to be directed to that location on the map.

Under Pan Mode, we can move, zoom and search the map in its editor

Drawing your communities

To draw your first community, select the paintbrush in the top right corner of the page. Click and drag on the map to add units to your community.

Under Paint Mode, we can color the districts of a community in
the editor by selecting it, while still able to zoom.

To draw an additional community, add a new color from the color bar by selecting the plus sign. A new color will appear and will be automatically selected for your use.

We define a new community coloring its districts after selecting a new color.

To change the size of the brush, drag the slider directly below the color bar or use the up/down arrows to the right of the slider.
To draw communities without overlapping them with the previous ones, toggle the “Lock already-drawn communities” box.

We demonstrate changing brush size and toggling lock already painted communities in the map editor.

To correct the boundaries of your communities, click the erase icon in the top right corner of the page. Click and drag to remove units from that community. The size of the eraser can be adjusted by dragging the slider or using the arrows to its right.

We remove districts from painted communities by switching to Erase mode.

Alternately, click the “undo/redo” buttons to revert the boundaries of your communities to a previous version. You can undo/redo as far back as your most recent use of the paint tool.

We use the undo and redo buttons in Erase mode to navigate through our
changes.

Examining the districts

To see detailed population or election information for a particular unit or group of units, select the magnifying glass in the top right corner.
Click the Tooltip Data dropdown menu to change the type of information shown. Then mouse over a particular unit to see the corresponding information for that unit.
To examine multiple units, drag the slider directly below the Tooltip Data menu or use the arrows to the right of the slider.

We can review unit statistics in inspect mode and can
choose the data and brush size.

Tabs

Drawing

The drawing tab allows you to name and describe each of the communities you have mapped, as well as adding important places from the area.

Areas of Interest

To select one of the areas you have mapped to name and describe, click on the drop-down menu and choose one of the ‘Communities’. They are numbered in the order that they were first drawn on the map, and they also have their corresponding color next to the name.
Once you selected the community from the menu, below you can change the name and add a description for the area. Those details are updated automatically.

Back in Pan Mode, we can add information on the name and
description of a drawn community selected from the dropdown menu.

Important places

To add a point of interest for your community, go to the important places section and click on the blue button that says ‘New’.
Pressing the button will prompt you to locate the spot on the map that you want to add as a point. Click on the map to add it.
Once you add a point in the map, you will be able to name it and give a description about the place. These changes will be saved automatically. The points you added will also stay on the map, and you can hover over them to see their names and descriptions.

In Pan mode, we can select an important place in the map
editor and give it a name and description.

To add more important places, press the ‘new’ button again, and repeat the previous steps. To switch between points, use the drop-down ‘Select’ menu. You can then edit place names and descriptions of the selected place.

We repeat the process of creating and describing a new important place on the map.

To remove a place you added, click on the red trash can button next to its name.

We can delete an important place selected in the drop down using the red trashcan button

Data Layers

The Data Layers tab allows you to display community, demographic, and electoral data, as available.

Communities

To hide the communities from the map, toggle the “Show my communities” box at the top of the tab.
To display county boundaries, toggle the “Show County Boundaries” box.
To see the boundaries and names of Nations and Tribes, toggle the “Show Nations and Tribes” box. Names of this field vary slightly by local naming conventions.

Demographics

Coalition Builder

Using the Coalition Builder tool, you can combine multiple demographic groups of your choosing into a shared “Coalition population.” Check off the name of each demographic group to add the group to your Coalition, and click again to uncheck and remove a group. Below the selection buttons, you can view the total population of the Coalition as well its percent composition of the jurisdiction as a whole.
Under the “Show population” and “Show voting age population” tabs, select the Coalition population from the dropdown menu to display this layer on the map.

Race

Toggle the “Show population box” and select the desired variable from the dropdown menu to view percent variable by unit. Using the dropdown menu for Display, choose to display the data as sized circles or shaded regions.

Socioeconomic data

Several states and other areas feature socioeconomic data from the American Community Survey (ACS). Available data include but are not limited to homeownership, household income, and broadband access. (Note: ACS data can be added to additional places upon request.)

Previous elections

Toggle the “Show partisan lean” box and select the desired set of election results from the dropdown menu to view partisan lean by unit. Using the dropdown menu for Display, choose to display the data as sized circles or shaded regions. Please note that this option is only available when building your communities out of precincts.

In the Data Layers toolbar,
we can also display partisan lean from previous election data offered in a drop down.

Evaluation

The evaluation tab allows you to see the racial, voting age population, and partisan balance of the communities you are mapping. Some communities pages have additional data for evaluation, such as household income and age.

Population by Race

You can compare the percentage of the population by race in each of your communities, and compare it to the overall composition of the state you are drawing in.

Voting Age Population by Race

As in the previous section, you can compare the percentage of the voting age population by race in each community. Voting Age Population (or VAP) is the group of people who are 18 years or older.

Age Histograms, Household Income, and other data

In some areas, there are options to evaluate additional demographic information, such as age and household income, in each community and compared to that of the overall locality. As with the Data Layers tab, this information is from the ACS.

In the Evaluation Toolbar, we can display data on Population
and other statistics for each community we draw.

Sharing your Map

Clicking on the “Share” button saves the map you created and uploads it to the Districtr database. You do not need to create an account, and only the information in your map is shared.

Once a plan is saved after we press the share button,
we can highlight and copy the link to our work.

As long as you are in the same browser session, you can update this original map, leaving the link unchanged. To save changes made to the map, click on the “Update” button (in the same location as the “Share” button once you have shared). You will know when your map is up to date when the button says “Saved.” You can keep repeating this process to edit and re-save your map as long as you are in the same browser session.

As we work on the map, before leaving the editor,
we can update changes to the same link by pressing the Update button near the Share button.

Anyone who has the link, including you, can open up the map in their browser and make additional changes to it. This edited map doesn’t replace the previous one, but you can save it to a new link by clicking “Share” again.

We use our link to save our loaded plan. Our changes
into a new plan.

Anyone who has the link, including you, can open up the map in their browser and make additional changes to it. These changes can be saved to a new link by clicking “Share” again. When the button says “Saved,” this means all changes are saved to the new link.

If anyone visits our saved plan, any edits they make are saved into
a new plan.

Whenever you need a copy of the link, click on the “Saved” button.
To download your map, choose from the options in the drop-down menu in the upper right corner. For more detail on these, refer to the Import/Export Options page.
Event Codes

MGGG can help you with map collection by setting up an event code for your organization.
Once you have an event code, you can tag maps with it. When you click “Share,” “Update,” or “Saved,” enter the event code and click “Tag your map.”
All maps tagged with an event code will be viewable in a dashboard available to the event organizers. Event codes can be used to compile a large quantity of maps for a region, to assess coverage and identify areas needing more community mapping, and to compare maps of specific communities. This can be to influence official map-drawing, for community organizing, for educational purposes, and more.

Getting Started with Districts

On the Districtr homepage, click “Jump to the Map” in the top right corner.
You will be redirected to an interactive map of the United States. Click the state for which you wish to make a districting plan. All states are available, as well as Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico.

Once you have selected a state, you will be directed to its landing page. The landing page contains all mapping options along with background information. Districting options are in purple, which is the default setting.
Choose a locality (state, region, county, or city) and district type by clicking on a purple card. The available localities and districts vary by state. (Additional localities can be added upon request.)

We enter the map editor by selecting a Statewide or
Cities option for the number and building blocks of districts.

You will now be redirected to your selected districting page.

Main Tools

Moving across the map

Select the hand icon in the top right corner of the page. Then click and drag to pan across the map.
To zoom in and out, use the plus and minus buttons in the top left corner of the map. You can also use a mouse scroll wheel or trackpad.

In the Pan mode, we can move and zoom the map in the editor.

Drawing the districts

To draw your first district, select the paintbrush icon in the top right corner of the page. Click and drag on the map to add units to your district.

In the Paint mode, we can draw a district by using a brush to
color in the building blocks.

To draw another district, select a new color from the color bar directly below the paintbrush icon. Each color corresponds to a different district. For pages with large numbers of districts, only one color will show when you start. For these, use the “+” button to add the remaining district colors.

We can draw a second district by selecting a different color for
which the brush can color in building blocks.

To change the size of the brush, drag the brush size slider directly below the color bar or use the up/down arrows to the right of the slider.

Just as we can select different districts by color, we can also
change the brush size by which we select building blocks.

To paint whole counties, toggle the “Paint counties” box below the slider.

By selecting Paint Counties, we can display and use counties as
building blocks. Brush Size will also respect this change.

To inspect districts without altering them, or to avoid painting over already-drawn areas, toggle the “Lock already-drawn districts” box.

We can avoid coloring over districts we have previously drawn by
toggling Lock already-drawn Districts.

To correct the boundaries of your districts, click the erase icon in the top right corner of the page. Click and drag to remove units from that district. The size of the eraser can be adjusted by dragging the slider or using the arrows to its right.

In Erase mode, we can set our eraser size and further edit our districts.
The Population Tab can calculate statistics on our changes in real time.

Alternately, click the “undo/redo” buttons to revert the boundaries of your district plan to a previous version. You can undo/redo as far back as your most recent use of the paint tool.

In Erase mode, we can also use the Undo and Redo buttons to navigate through
our changes.

Examining the districts

To see detailed population or election information for a particular unit or group of units, select the magnifying glass in the top right corner.
Click the Tooltip Data dropdown menu to change the type of information shown. The options available vary by page. Then mouse over a particular unit to see the corresponding information for that unit.

In Inspect mode, we can use a spot light to display data we select from
a dropdown like Population and Election Results.

To examine multiple units, drag the slider directly below the Tooltip Data menu or use the arrows to the right of the slider.

We can change the spotlight size to inspect the statistics of multiple
building blocks.

Tabs

Population

The population tab allows you to view the population of each drawn district. To balance your population evenly between districts, make reference to the ideal population count and vertical bar provided in this tab.
To see which units you still need to color, click the “Highlight unassigned units” box at the bottom of the tab..

Data Layers

The Data Layers tab allows you to display districts, boundaries, demographic, and electoral data, as available.

Districts

To hide the districts from the map, toggle the “Show districts” box at the top of the tab.
To see county boundaries overlaid on your map, toggle the “Show County Boundaries” box.
To see the boundaries and names of Nations and Tribes, toggle the “Show Nations and Tribes” box.Names of this field vary slightly by local naming conventions.

Demographics

Coalition Builder

Using the Coalition Builder tool, you can combine multiple demographic groups of your choosing into a shared “Coalition population.” Check off the name of each demographic group you want to add to your Coalition, and click again to uncheck and remove a group. Below the selection buttons, you can view the total population of the Coalition as well its percent composition of the jurisdiction as a whole.
Under the “Show population” and “Show voting age population” tabs, select the Coalition population from the dropdown menu to display this layer on the map.

In the Data Layers tab, we can also assemble a coalition
and display their population as a shaded region on the map.

Race

Toggle the “Show population box” and select the desired variable from the dropdown menu to view percent variable by unit. Using the dropdown menu for Display, choose to display the data as sized circles or shaded regions.

Socioeconomic data

Several states and other areas feature socioeconomic data from the American Community Survey (ACS). Available features include but are not limited to: homeownership, household income, and broadband access. (Note: ACS data can be added to additional localities upon request.)

We can also shade the map using Sociopolitical variables like Percent Renter.

Previous elections

Toggle the “Show partisan lean” box and select the desired set of election results from the dropdown menu to view partisan lean by unit. Using the dropdown menu for Display, choose to display the data as sized circles or shaded regions. Please note that this option is only available when building your districts out of precincts.

Under the Partisan Lean drop down, we can display the party
results of any previous election we select in the drop down.

Evaluation

The evaluation tab allows you to see the racial, voting age population, and partisan balance of the district plan you’re making. Some districting pages have additional data for evaluation, such as household income and age.

Population by Race

You can compare the percentage of the population by race for districts, relative to one another and relative to the overall composition of the area. Use the drop-down menus to compare different races.

Voting Age Population (or VAP) is the group of people who are 18 years or older. As in the previous section, you can compare the percentage of the voting age population by race for districts, relative to one another and relative to the overall composition of the area. Use the drop-down menus to compare different races.

You can compare the percentage of votes received by the republican and the democratic candidate for a variety of elections, by your districts and relative to the overall partisan lean. In places where we show candidates by other parties or variation within parties, candidate names and/or parties are listed. Note: because we only show two-party vote shares, the overall percentage may differ slightly from official percentages, which include third party candidates

In some areas, there are options to evaluate the age and household income distribution of the population in each district. Some areas also have the ability to check the contiguity of the districts you have drawn.

In this example, we show how the evaluation tab
alerts us to discontiguous units, highlighted for our convenience.

Sharing your Map

Clicking the “Share” button saves the map you created and uploads it to the Districtr database. You do not need to create an account, and only the information in your map is shared.

After we complete our work, we can press the share button to
generate a link to our plan.

As long as you are in the same browser session, you can update this original map, leaving the link unchanged. To save changes made to the map, click on the “Update” button (in the same location as the “Share” button once you have shared). You will know when your map is up to date when the button says “Saved.” You can keep repeating this process to edit and re-save your map as long as you are in the same browser session.

Anyone who has the link, including you, can open up the map in their browser and make additional changes to it. These changes can be saved to a new link by clicking “Share” again. When the button says “Saved,” this means all changes are saved to the new link.

Anyone who loads our plan using our link and makes edits,
including ourselves, will have our changes saved to a new map.

Whenever you need a copy of the link, click on the “Saved” button.
To download your map, choose from the options in the drop-down menu in the upper right corner. For more detail on these, refer to the Import/Export Options page.

Event Codes

MGGG can help you with map collection by setting up an event code for your organization.
Once you have an event code, you can tag maps with it. When you click “Share,” “Update,” or “Saved,” enter the event code and click “Tag your map.”
All maps tagged with an event code will be viewable in a dashboard available to the event organizers.
Event codes can be used to compile and compare a large quantity of maps for a region. Map collections made through events can in turn be used to influence official map-drawing, for community organizing, for educational purposes, and more.