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Roslindale: Boston's afterthought of a neighborhood

Ed. note: Carter Wilkie sent in this "letter to the editor" after the City Council on Wednesday approved a new map for ciy-council districts:

Roslindale loses in redistricting -- again. The neighborhood had one city councilor (District 5) but is now split three ways (districts 4, 5, 7). Even worse, the new center of gravity in district 5 shifts so heavily towards Hyde Park/Mattapan that it virtually ensures no candidate from Roslindale will be able to mount a base of support to win this district in the future.

Incumbent politicians from other neighborhoods have repeatedly carved up Roslindale in redistricting, disenfranchising a neighborhood. In the last round of redistricting on Beacon Hill, Roslindale was carved up among four state representatives from other communities (Coppinger from West Roxbury, Sanchez and Malia from Jamaica Plain, and Scaccia from Hyde Park).

Roslindale, with a population of 34,000, is the largest community in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts without a resident in any elected office. No other community in Boston is as splintered on electoral maps, and no other community has less of a voice when it comes to protecting its interests.

Through redistricting at City Hall and Beacon Hill, Roslindale has been transformed into an afterthought for politicians who live in other places.

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Comments

Almost all of the zone reform proposals involve the Bates and Conley leaving the Roslindale zone to become part of a Hyde Park zone.

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Roslindale is like the Kurds - their neighbors keep it carved up and powerless. Let my people go!

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MA having a certain notereity in this area, you would think such blatant attempts to disenfranchise the electorate would be a thing of the past. By the way, I just got carved.

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