A public hearing of the state’s independent congressional redistricting commission in Colorado Springs on Thursday turned up only two speakers and wrapped up within an hour, a stark contrast to similar meetings that have drawn dozens of speakers and have lasted three hours or more.

Colorado Springs resident Katherine Czukas and El Paso County Commissioner Carrie Geitner were the meeting’s sole witnesses. Both told the redistricting commission they prefer to keep the El Paso County community in a separate congressional district from neighboring counties to the west, such as Teller, Fremont and Park counties.

“It’s different up there,” Czukas said. “Once you get downhill of Wilkerson Pass (on U.S. 24), it doesn’t feel anything like the city of Colorado Springs, from my perspective.”

An ‘ordinary citizen’ testified at a redistricting commission hearing. It was actually part of a paid lobbying effort.

Geitner thanked the congressional redistricting commission for keeping most of El Paso County together in its draft preliminary map, a move she said was important to several community groups including local chambers of commerce and the Pikes Peak Area Council of Governments. The preliminary draft map of Colorado’s new congressional districts divides El Paso County, with the southeast portion in a separate congressional district.

Geitner also told redistricting commissioners if they need to revise preliminary congressional district boundaries based on upcoming census data they should consider making those adjustments on the county’s western and eastern boundaries, where it is seeing the most growth.

Thursday’s meeting came as the commission and its counterpart for drawing state legislative districts are touring Colorado, gathering input from the public across the state. At most of the open hearings, members of the public have testified that they don’t like the maps, for one reason or another, and offered suggestions for adjustments to make as the commissions modify the preliminary draft maps in the coming weeks. A minority of public testimony has been in support of the preliminary draft maps.

At the same time, the commissions are scrambling to finish the constitutionally obligated hearings, prepare more draft maps, then vote on a final map, with enough time for the state supreme court to review and approve the maps for use in next year’s election.

The congressional redistricting commission plans to finish its map by Oct. 1. The legislative redistricting commission plans to finish its map by Sept. 15, but might adjust the target date for more time to draft the maps.

A wrench was thrown into the gears of the process this year, when census data was delayed because of the global coronavirus pandemic. Normally the data would have been released in the spring. The census bureau has said it now plans to release it Aug. 12, only two-and-a-half weeks ahead of the deadline for a final map to be prepared, according to the constitutional amendments approved by voters to create the commission system in 2018.

The congressional redistricting commission decided last week to blow those deadlines, following the state supreme court releasing a hearing schedule on the maps that doesn’t begin until October, in response to a request for clarity on the timeline it needed to follow.

In addition to the intention now to sail past the constitution’s deadlines, the congressional redistricting commission in July added more meetings for August, preparing for the possibility that the court had issued a ruling explicitly saying the commission could not miss the deadlines.

Thursday’s hearing in Colorado Springs was one of those additional meetings, which could have contributed to its low turnout, said Lisa Wilkes, a Colorado Springs resident and member of the Colorado Independent Redistricting Commission who chaired the meeting.

Despite the low attendance, Wilkes said the feedback congressional redistricting commissioners received was helpful.

“It’s always good to get perspectives from different people,” she said.

Wilkes expects more community feedback when redistricting commissioners return to Colorado Springs on Aug. 28, she said.

The commissions will hold joint hearings Friday, in Trinidad at 11 a.m. and Alamosa at 7 p.m. The congressional commission will also hold a public hearing in Manitou Springs Monday at 7 p.m.

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An ‘ordinary citizen’ testified at a redistricting commission hearing. It was actually part of a paid lobbying effort.