49.4 Precincts drawn by county board.

Where action by the board of supervisors is necessary or deemed advisable by the board of supervisors or the temporary county redistricting commission, the boundaries of precincts shall be definitely fixed by ordinance. A public hearing shall be held before final action is taken to adopt changes in the precinct boundaries. Notice of the date, time, and place of the hearing shall be given as provided in chapter 21. In the absence of contrary action by the board of supervisors or the temporary county redistricting commission, each civil township which does not include any part of a city of over two thousand population, and the portion of each civil township containing any such city which lies outside the corporate limits of that city or those cities, shall constitute an election precinct. If no action is necessary to change the county election precincts, the board of supervisors shall certify the retained boundaries to the state commissioner, as required by section 49.7.

1. Where a civil township, or the portion of a civil township outside the corporate limits of any city of over two thousand population contained within the civil township, is divided into two or more election precincts, the precincts shall be so drawn that their total populations shall be reasonably equal on the basis of data available from the most recent federal decennial census, except where the division is necessary to comply with section 49.3, subsection 3.

2. Counties using alternative supervisor representation plans “two” or “three”, as described in section 331.206, shall be apportioned into single-member supervisor districts on the basis of population. In counties using representation plan “three”, the boundaries of supervisor districts shall follow the boundaries of election precincts.

3. a. Notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter, Indian settlement land held in trust by the secretary of the interior of the United States for the Sac and Fox tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa and its trust land contiguous to the Indian settlement lying in Tama, Toledo and Indian Village townships of Tama county shall be an election precinct. The polling place of that precinct shall be located on the Indian settlement in a structure designated by the election commissioner of Tama county.

b. The Indian settlement precinct shall be redrawn to include land contiguous to the Indian settlement when such land is purchased by the settlement and added to the Indian settlement land held in trust by the secretary of the interior of the United States. Upon recording of the deed transferring the land to the United States in trust, the county recorder shall notify the county commissioner of that fact. If the commissioner is notified more than seventy days before the next scheduled election, the commissioner shall redraw the precinct for that election. The commissioner shall notify the board of supervisors of the redrawn precinct boundaries and shall certify the redrawn boundaries to the state commissioner. Land completely surrounded by the boundaries of the Indian settlement precinct, but not included in the settlement precinct, shall be included in the precinct in which such land was located prior to redrawing of the Indian settlement precinct. The commissioner shall notify registered voters in each of the redrawn precincts of the change in the precincts and the proper polling place for those affected voters.

[C73, §603; C97, §1090; S13, §1090; C24, 27, 31, 35, 39, §722, 725; C46, 50, 54, 58, 62, 66, 71, 73, §49.4, 49.7; C75, 77, 79, 81, S81, §49.4; 81 Acts, ch 117, §1203]

94 Acts, ch 1179, §6; 99 Acts, ch 17, §2; 2008 Acts, ch 1032, §201; 2010 Acts, ch 1026, §1

Referred to in §49.3, 49.7, 49.8, 49.11, 273.8, 331.210A, 331.383