Tulare County Delays Decision on Approving New Redistricting Map

August 30, 2011

The Tulare County Board of Supervisors today delayed a vote to approve one of the three proposed redistricting maps submitted by the 2011 Advisory Committee on Redistricting for the redrawing of Supervisorial district lines.

Tulare County Administrative Officer Jean Rousseau said a review requested by County staff and performed by outside counsel hired by the Board of Supervisors identified differences between its results and the population variances in the final maps. The population variances were outside of the two percent deviation goal - used by the Advisory Committee - on maps Plan A and Plan C. Plan B remained within the two percent deviation.

The Board of Supervisors today directed staff to form an Ad Hoc committee to correct maps Plan A and Plan C and schedule a final public hearing for September 27, 2011. At the Sept. 27 meeting, one of the three maps will be considered for approval.

Chairman of the Board of Supervisors Mike Ennis said all members of the 2011 Advisory Committee on Redistricting will be asked to participate in the Ad Hoc committee to address the issue while preserving the integrity of the proposed maps. Members of the public will be invited to comment at future scheduled meetings.

“I’m confident that members of the Redistricting Committee can address this issue promptly,” Chairman Ennis said.

Discrepancy

The decision to duplicate and verify the three proposed maps was to ensure that the maps reflected the correct population numbers prior to today’s Tulare County Board of Supervisors meeting.

Rousseau said that when staff, working with Nielsen Merksamer, attempted to verify census block information within the three proposed maps using different software, the same results could not be reached. Nielsen Merksamer, hired by Tulare County as outside counsel for the redistricting process, identified the issue late last week.

“Accuracy is the highest priority in this important process,” Rousseau said. “We need to get back to the high standard of accuracy we’d already set for ourselves.”

Rousseau stressed, however, that despite the differences all three of the Committee’s proposed plans meet constitutional equal population requirements, regardless of the software relied upon.

“There has been a tremendous amount of work put in by the Committee, the public and our staff in the creation of these proposed lines,” Rousseau said.

County GIS staff advised the Board at today’s meeting that the errors were apparently due to the software used by the County (the outside counsel uses different software).  These original errors were then carried over as later versions of each map were developed.

About the Tulare County Redistricting Process

Tulare County supervisorial district lines are reviewed and redrawn every 10 years based upon United States Census information. These district boundaries define the political representation on the Board of Supervisors. Per state law, the new district boundaries must be approved by Oct. 31, 2011. The three proposed maps were created and submitted for possible adoption by the Advisory Committee on Redistricting - a group of 11 residents appointed by the Tulare County Board of Supervisors - on July 26, 2011.

The Redistricting Committee received input from the public on sample maps during five outreach meetings, one in each Supervisorial district.  The committee took five scenarios to the public outreach meetings, and received five additional proposals from members of the public.  After the public outreach forums, the committee met four times to review the public comments and ultimately decided to recommend three scenarios to the Board of Supervisors for possible adoption.

At three separate public meetings in April and May, residents were asked to provide their input on what criteria should be used to draw Tulare County’s supervisorial lines. Criteria that were selected include:  topography; geography; continuity and compactness; avoid dividing cities wherever possible; and avoid dividing urban growth areas, among others.