Members of a special city committee continued their efforts to hammer out the details on redistricting the aldermanic districts in Madison and the size and pay of the City Council at a meeting Tuesday evening.

The special committee, composed of an equal number of alders and community members, weighed in on the concerns brought forward by City Council members at a special hearing last week.

“The very reason this collective was created was so that we didn’t politicize and gerrymander the districts,” Ald. Tim Bruer, District 14, said. “I was feeling much better at this meeting with this collective.”

The 10-person think tank will start the beginning steps of outlining the new boundaries for the city’s districts once city data from the 2010 Census arrives. The details are expected to come forward this week – a month earlier than the information was provided the last time the city went through the redistricting process.

The project’s lead planner Brian Grady presented the group with a series of maps outlining aldermanic districts and wards, as well as elementary school attendance districts in order to see what the results might look like.

A number of committee members expressed their concerns with the current district division. Primarily, Ald. Steve King, District 7, said there are several districts that contain small islands that are technically parts of other districts. He said this complicates the boundaries and interferes with governing.

In effort to work toward more manageable districts, committee members agreed to work to create districts with four to five wards composed of around 2,000 to 3,000 people. In redistributing the borders, the committee said it hopes to decrease geographic conflict and confusion that comes with neighboring districts.

In a previous meeting, members created a list of guiding principles to help monitor their progress in the redistribution project, which included maintaining ‘communities of interest.’ At Tuesday’s meeting, committee members brainstormed communities that would have an influence on the final plan.

The group debated on where these special areas of interest are in Madison. The committee preliminarily settled on including neighborhood and household associations, the student areas and retail centers.

Along with considering the aldermanic districts, the committee is also responsible for evaluating the City Council in its current form and determining whether changes in the council’s number or function are required.

Although the number might fluctuate when legislation is passed later in the planning process, the committee temporarily recommended keeping the number of alders at 20, plus or minus two alders.

While the committee did not agree on a specific recommendation for alder compensation, members agreed alders required a salary at least sufficient to support themselves while working a separate job part time.

“Overall, the thought was to keep the alders part-time and possibly add a wage so that they can balance those [jobs],” Grady said.

The committee also said it was necessary to obtain community feedback before presenting plans to the city. The committee began plans to incorporate a public forum into its timeline.

“I’m much more inclined to community conversation and local input,” Ald. Satya Rhodes-Conway, District 13, said. “I would like to work on the presumption that we are actually interested in hearing what people have to say.”

In accordance with state law, the city has to complete the process by the beginning of summer.