Council: Priority to green, yellow
Second public hearing for district maps scheduled for April 3
The Porterville City Council decided Tuesday to move forward with all three district maps in the order of green, yellow and purple.
The council also directed city staff that it wants the current election cycle for the current council to align with the district mapping of whatever district map is eventually chosen.
The public hearing held Tuesday was the first of two to receive public input on the three draft maps presented for consideration and for reference purposes.
Only two residents gave their input on the proposed maps, a number the council hopes increases at the second public hearing, which is scheduled for April 3.
“I definitely think that a little bit more public input would help,” said Councilmember Monte Reyes.
In reviewing the maps and all of the figures, Porterville resident Edith Lavonne said she likes the green map best because she feels it has “a lot to offer,” and because two council members wouldn’t be in the same district, which is the case with the purple map.
Lavonne said the yellow map would be her second choice, but noted that she doesn’t like the purple map at all.
“It [purple map] doesn’t seem as equitable,” Lavonne said. “I like the green [map] even though purple is my favorite color.”
Two council members in the same district is something Porterville resident John Duran definitely doesn’t want to see occur.
“I don’t think it is going to defeat the purpose of going by-district elections,” Duran said, adding, “I would like to see council members representing the specific district that they are elected in.”
In terms of the process of moving from an at-large voting system to by-district elections, Duran said he would love to see the city move on the matter “as soon as possible.”
“I know they gave you a time frame, but I think it is encouraging for you people to get on board and get whatever needs to be done to get this thing in motion,” Duran said. “I think it would benefit the city greatly, and I want to thank you for moving in this direction because I can see some changes coming and I think it is going to benefit everyone.”
Shalice Tilton, a senior consultant with National Demographics Corporation (NDC), the agency aiding the city in transitioning from an at-large voting system to bydistrict elections, said the primary goal is to make sure the districts are balanced. She said whichever district map the council ultimately chooses will reflect 2010 census data, but noted that NDC will be redoing the process in 2021 to readjust the boundaries to ensure there is equal population.
“We understand that it is outdated and that there’s been growth in Porterville that is not going to reflect it,” Tilton said.
Tilton said every map NDC produces must be posted for the public to review seven days in advance before they can be considered by council. She said NDC is able to make revisions to existing maps that have been published, but noted that once those revisions are made they must be posted seven days before the council’s next public hearing.
Tilton said each of the maps represent two districts that have a majority Hispanic population, which she said is based on the citizen voting age population.
“Those are the folks who are eligible to vote and that is the measure that the courts use in determining the voting strength of a district,” Tilton said, adding that the most important driving factor is communities of interest.
With regard to the district maps, Tilton said each of them represent very compact districts. She said the green and yellow maps have each council member residing in their own district. She noted that NDC recommends to respect the wishes of the voters and not focus on protecting council seats when creating maps.
With the green map, Tilton said it tries to bring as many districts to touch the city’s downtown areas as possible.
“That is important to some agencies to have as much representation in the downtown area as possible,” Tilton said.
Tilton added that there are at least four districts that intersect Highway 65 with the green map.
Also with the green map, Tilton said the districts with the highest citizen voting age population for Hispanics is district three at 62 percent and district five at 56 percent. As far as having equal population, Tilton said it is important to stay under a 10 percent deviation between the highest populated district and the least populated district.
“We are within that parameter at 4.48 percent with the green map,” Tilton said.
With the purple map, Tilton said it shares similarities with the green map in that there are four districts that touch Highway 65. She noted, however, that with the purple map the downtown area is mostly represented by one district.
Another challenge with the purple map, Tilton said, is that it pairs two council members into district three.
“The pairing is particularly difficult because the two council members that are paired in district three have different election years,” Tilton said, adding that such a situation would make it confusing for the voters and would make it so that one council member would not have the ability to run
for office to continue. “It wouldn’t allow the voters to re-elect one council member and they would have to sit out for two years.”
Tilton noted, however, that it is possible to make some slight adjustments and move a section of the map into district five, which is vacant, to avoid the pairing.
Tilton added that in the purple map, district three has the highest citizen voting age population for Hispanics at 59 percent, followed by the next highest in district five with 57 percent.
As far as the yellow map, Tilton said it has only three districts that touch Highway 65 and keeps district four compact and “way to the far west of the city.”
“There’s a little bit more north, south, east, west and center depicted in the yellow map,” Tilton said.
In terms of the highest citizen voting age population for Hispanics in the yellow map, Tilton said district three has 63 percent and district five has 56 percent.
Vice Mayor Brian Ward said his only problem with the yellow map is that he doesn’t want district four “to be that district where you do some horse trading,” he said.
“And it is easier to do that because they [district four] really don’t have a commercial interest,” Ward said, adding that with the other maps, “You have a lot of areas that are intersecting throughout the community, you tend to have more agreement in terms of commercial development. There is a vested interest from all of the districts in terms of seeing all of the areas benefit.”
With the green map, Ward said he doesn’t have any specific improvements to add.