New redistricting map unveiled - Oxnard won't split up under latest proposal
Ventura County Star (CA)
Friday, May 6, 2011
A new proposal for carving the districts represented by the Ventura County Board of Supervisors was unveiled Thursday in the face of stiff opposition to a plan that would have split Oxnard among four supervisors.
The latest concept would give Oxnard Supervisor John Zaragoza the beach areas instead of transfer ring them to Supervisor Linda Parks of Thousand Oaks. It would create a second Latino-dominated district in the county and keep at three the number of supervisors with a stake in fast-growing Oxnard.
'This is probably one of the best plans we could come up with,' said Zaragoza, who represents the Oxnard-based 5th District.
Zaragoza and Supervisor Steve Bennett released the proposal Thursday, in time for it to be discussed next week by county supervisors at a public hearing in Ventura. The two men said the plan would meet legal requirements for equalizing the population of the five supervisorial districts, do so with minimal disruption and would address Oxnard residents' concerns over splitting the city.
"I think it's a reasonable plan and has a reasonable chance of being accepted," Bennett said.
Supervisors are wrestling with the question of how to adjust boundary lines after the 2010 Census showed Zaragoza's district had surged well ahead of the others in population.
Under federal law, the districts represented by county supervisors must each have one-fifth of the county's population of 823,000. They can vary by no more than 1 percent from highest to lowest without inviting a legal challenge, county attorneys say.
In the new alternative, Parks would not have any territory in what's now the 5th District. She would, however, pick up Somis, CSU Channel Islands and a portion of the Tierra Rejada Valley.
Supervisor Kathy Long of Camarillo would add to her south Oxnard territory under the plan. That would create a second district with a majority Latino population, joining the 5th District. Currently, three-quarters of the 5thDistrict is Latino.
The county affiliate of the League of United Latin American Citizens wants a second Latino dominated district. Activists say that must be done to provide adequate representation for the group that makes up 40 percent of the county population.
Bennett, who represents portions of north Oxnard, drew complaints from Oxnard residents and City Council members when he suggested the four-way split. Although supervisors initially supported the idea, they quickly moved to other options after city residents and business interests complained in a public hearing in April.
This week, the Oxnard City Council joined in, opposing any scenario in which the county's largest city would be split among four supervisors.
Zaragoza said the plan is a response to those concerns.
"There are a lot of people that wanted me to keep Oxnard intact, contiguous and to keep all the communities of (common) interest," he said.
Among those areas are coastal neighborhoods that would have gone to Parks under the earlier plan. Instead, Zaragoza would get all the beach areas within the city limits as well as Channel Islands Harbor and the unincorporated communities of Hollywood Beach and Silver Strand.
Zaragoza said the new proposal would shift boundaries across the county rather than center them in Oxnard.
"Everybody works together," he said. "Hopefully, the other supervisors will support it."
Zaragoza and Bennett announced the alternative five days ahead of a public hearing on the boundary changes. It is the fourth proposal that's been made since the discussions began last month.
The hearing is scheduled for 3:30 p.m. Tuesday in the board room at the Hall of Administration, Ventura County Government Center, 800 S. Victoria Ave., Ventura.
The board is not scheduled to take action at that hearing, but may give direction to staff on how the boundaries will eventually be defined.
The board is set to take final action on new boundaries in July.
On the Net: http://ventura.org/redistricting