http://www.freep.com/article/2011090...ity-corruption

If voters approve the proposal, the current council would be charged with creating the districts. Council President Charles Pugh expects the new districts to be created by February, once the new precincts are drawn up to reflect the population changes in the 2010 census.

One of the goals, Pugh said, is breaking up downtown -- where the wealthiest population lives -- into multiple districts and matching them up with neighborhoods. The idea, he said, is to ensure that districts are relatively similar in economic status.

"We want to do this in an extremely nonpolitical way so that it is open, transparent and has as much community input as possible," Pugh said, adding that the council may begin hosting town hall-style meetings as early as November to hear what Detroiters want out of the districts.

"We don't want to create impoverished or super-rich districts."

Eve Hicks, a 26-year-old who lives in Midtown, said the charter offers hope for a city trying to reinvent itself.

"It's a good start," said Hicks, who moved to the city in 2008. "Districts are important to me because you'll know who your council member is. It's part of engaging residents."

If voters reject the revised charter, there would still be council by districts. That's because Detroiters, in 2009, approved Proposal D, which called for creating seven district seats and two at-large district seats. Either way, Detroiters would elect council members by district starting in 2013.
This might seem like a laudable goal on its face, but does it make sense to have neighborhoods which will have very different needs in the same district? Should we be pushing instead for pluralism?