The San Benito County Board of Supervisors agreed Tuesday to
move forward with government-mandated redistricting and passed up
the creation of a Redistricting Advisory Committee made up of local
residents.
The San Benito County Board of Supervisors agreed Tuesday to move forward with government-mandated redistricting and passed up the creation of a Redistricting Advisory Committee made up of local residents.
The board voted to skip creation of the citizen committee in a 3-2 vote, with Supervisors Anthony Botelho and Robert Rivas dissenting.
The federal government, following the release of 2010 census data, forces redistricting of supervisors’ districts in each county, County Counsel Matthew Granger said to the board.
After a brief discussion Tuesday, the board voted to have county staff come up with three alternatives for a redistricting solution to “save time.” Under federal law, the board must hold two public hearings and have a new plan by Nov. 1.
The adjustment of the supervisors’ jurisdictions would depend on the county’s population shifts and it is to bring each district into compliance with the “one person, one vote” federal mandate, Granger said. Each district must have similar, or the same, population.
Each supervisor’s district must be within 3 percentage points of 20 percent of the county’s population. After the 2010 census, the county’s population was 55,269 – more than 10,500 in each district.
In the past 10 years, the county has grown by more than 2,000 people and the population has changed in each district, according to information presented to the board.
Botelho’s District 2 has grown the most, with more than a 1,000-person jump from 10 years ago, according to the redistricting information. District 3 represented by Rivas and District 5 represented by Jaime De La Cruz lost residents over that time.
But changes were minimal.
“There wasn’t that significant of a change,” County Administrative Officer Rich Inman said.
With a short timetable, Supervisor Margie Barrios thought it would be best to move forward and not slow down the decision with a committee, she said.
“Because time is of the essence, I would like to see staff go ahead and bring back some options with some reasoning,” she said.
Supervisor Jerry Muenzer thought it was unfair to expect a committee to come back was a good plan after only a month of work, he said. If the board approved a committee, it would need to give a plan to the county before Aug. 1.
“After a month, they would just be getting to know each other,” he said.
Hoping for more defined boundaries, Botelho wanted to look at how and why the jurisdictions were drawn to make it less confusing, he said.
“Not to open a can of worms, but I think it’s time to take a look at the reasoning behind these boundaries,” he said.
Some of the reasoning behind each jurisdiction is topography, geography and the interest of each community, according to the state’s election code.
The board will be presented with plans for redistricting soon, Inman said.
