Rural Baldwin resident Barbara James will let the ballot be her guide.

Though she knows congressional district boundaries changed this summer, she hasn’t quite figured out whether she lives on the Moore or Ryun side of the new line.

“I will know when I go to vote,” she said.

For Douglas County voters who didn’t go to the polls during the August primary, the Nov. 5 general election may mark their first time voting for a candidate outside the 3rd District.

The ballot will clear up any lingering confusion. But in the meantime, signs indicate that James might not be the only person who’s unclear about who they’ll be allowed to vote for.

“We get calls,” Deputy County Clerk Jo Dalquest said. “People want to know which congressional district they’re in. They see the political signs out, and they know the redistricting went on. Some of them just aren’t tuned in to where they might be.”

For most of Lawrence, Iowa Street is the dividing line that splits the 2nd and 3rd Districts. The boundaries become more jagged north and south of town. Republican Jim Ryun is the incumbent in the 2nd District and will face Democrat Dan Lykins; Democrat Dennis Moore (who formerly represented most of Douglas County) will square off against Republican challenger Adam Taff in the 3rd.

Iowa Street has become the rough dividing line between the 2nd and 3rd congressional districts in Lawrence, but many Douglas County voters are still unsure whether they'll be choosing between incumbent Democrat Dennis Moore and Republican Adam Taff in the 3rd District east of Iowa, or Republican incumbent Jim Ryun and Democrat Dan Lykins, in the 2nd District west of Iowa.

Mayor Sue Hack is well aware that her west Lawrence address falls in Ryun’s district, but that doesn’t stop her from driving around town with a Dennis Moore sticker on her BMW.

“I’m just a supporter of the congressman,” Hack said. “I think he’s been terrific for Lawrence in a lot of ways. I supported him the other two times he’s run, so I just felt like putting the sticker on my car.”

Kansas University political science professor Burdett Loomis said that in recent weeks he had noticed people displaying yard signs for candidates not running in their district, but he didn’t think it was a sign of confusion.

“I think people are pretty clear on what’s going on,” he said. “A few people may show up to the polls looking to vote for Dennis Moore and find out they can’t.”

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It’s hard to predict, he said, whether the change will affect voting patterns, such as deterring longtime Moore supporters who now live in the 2nd District from going to the polls at all.

“Honestly, I don’t think it’s going to change things very much,” he said. “I think that, potentially, had all of Lawrence gone into the 2nd District, that Jim Ryun at some point might have had some problems.”

As for James, the rural Baldwin resident said she had been doing her best to keep up with all the races. And, shifting congressional districts wouldn’t keep her away from the polls: “It won’t change whether I vote or not.”

For the record, James will be selecting between Ryun and Lykins.