A statewide phone survey and series of focus groups found out what was on the mind of PA voters. Above all, they wanted the lines for our state’s voting districts to be drawn fairly.
And no wonder. Look at how Pennsylvania’s voting districts are drawn — they’re a picture of partisan politics gone wrong. PA law states the lines should follow municipal boundaries, but the erratic shapes of our districts show otherwise.
How does this occur? A commission of five legislators draws the lines for all districts — including their own. In other words, they’re choosing their voters. Shouldn’t it be the other way around? And the commission has used technology and big data to carve up communities to suit their own self-interests.
Our campaign objective was to tell the story of how gerrymandering threatens our democracy and the value of our votes. A test flight featuring radio, print and digital ads was run in key rural areas of the state to capture voters’ attention and guide them to a landing page where the basics of the issue were laid out.
The campaign also introduced Fair Districts PA as a dynamic grassroots champion for addressing the problem of gerrymandering head-on, with a viable strategy for alleviating the imbalances that partisan politics has created.
