Colorado’s independent congressional redistricting commissioners met Tuesday night to select a final plan for the state’s remapped U.S. House districts — but by the time of publication, they hadn’t yet selected a final map.

The 12 commissioners, made up of four Democrats, four Republicans and four party-unaffiliated Coloradans, had nine maps to consider. They struggled to reach the consensus required in the state constitution to adopt a final map plan, within the first three rounds of voting, more than four hours after their meeting began.

In order to adopt a final map, eight of the 12 commissioners, including at least two of the four party-unaffiliated commissioners, need to support a single map.

If the commissioners couldn’t get the support for one map required, then the most recent map drawn by the commission’s non-partisan staff will have been adopted by default.

By the time you read this article, the results of the evening will be available online at gazette.com.

The Tuesday night vote followed months of deliberation over the competing redistricting criteria, dozens of public input hearings and multiple draft maps attempting to redraw the state’s congressional districts, with the newly added 8th Congressional District. 

Over the past several weeks, momentum had built around an overall mapping approach that relied on a “Southern District” that attempted to keep together the Hispanic communities of Colorado’s southern rural areas and a new 8th Congressional District designed around the rapidly growing and also heavily Hispanic suburbs stretching north of Denver.