Solano County Supervisorial Districts To Recieve New Boundaries

Solano County officials are set to meet face to face with residents this week to gain public comment on possible supervisorial district redistricting scenarios.

“This is an opportunity for people to look at three proposed alternative redistricting scenarios,” said John Taylor, consultant to the county. “These are just proposals that have come out of the level of staff work that involve myself, county counsel, the county administrators office, the registrar of voters and information technology to be able to get some comment on. They will then be taken back to the board of supervisors for additional comment and direction from them.”

The public meetings -- which are scheduled from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. -- will be held in various county locations. On Tuesday, the first, will be at the Solano County Events Center, 601 Texas St. in Fairfield. Wednesday’s meeting will be  at , 600 East A Street, in Dixon, and Thursday’s meeting will be at Solano Community College, Vallejo Campus, Room 122, 545 Columbus Parkway in Vallejo.

The draft maps that will be available for viewing (click here to view the maps) are in response to a federal census report showing population growth within the county. According to the 2010 census, the population has grown from 394,542 in 2000 to 413,344 in 2010.

Within the five supervisorial districts in the county, growth from the census in 2001 for District 1 shows a 949 resident jump in population in 2010, District 2 shows a jump of  2,723, District 3 had an increase of 7,825, District 4 saw an increase of 435 and District 5 had an increase of 6,670.   

The increases mean that district populations are now uneven and federal law requires that populations within those districts be as even as possible.

“So then you say OK you have the population divided by what each supervisorial
 district should be plus or minus a percentage or two,” said District 5 Supervisor Mike Reagan. “The districts are supposed to be as roughly equal in size as you can make them so when you have growth that has occurred in Vacaville, Dixon and Rio Vista and you have shrinkage in Vallejo, then what happens is the lines of the districts appear to change. Suisun, Dixon, South Vacaville and Rio Vista is in my district. So most of the growth areas are in my district.”   

Taylor, the consultant who is assisting the county, is no stranger to Solano. He has held the position of  director of environmental management  and has also held other positions as well. He retired from the county in 2006.  

“I’ve been involved in local government consulting and land-use consulting for the last four years,” Taylor said.   

He added the task of putting together the proposed maps centered around receiving census numbers form the census bureau. The bureau also provides maps that contain  geographic information.

“So basically we have census blocks in Solano County which are small and are basically neighborhood size and contain all the data which was conducted last April of 2010,” he said. “That information is available to all jurisdictions in the United States. The information technology department and registrar of voters was able to download the data.”

Taylor said he and his team had to the take the data and determine how the population fit into the existing boundaries and then determine what needed to be done to bring the districts into close alignment.

“As the other districts are going to have to have their boundaries adjusted so that they have the right amount of population, there’s going to be the movement of lines,” Reagan said. “There will be alternatives cranked and we haven’t seen any of those yet and we probably won’t see that until May or June.”

Taylor added the combination of District 1 and District 2 needed to add about 4,000 people. The only way to get that number was from District 3. He also said District 4 needed 3,500 to 4,000 people and District 5 in turn had to shed that many people.   

He said officials then drew lines in different directions to balance the populations within the districts.   

“The three alternatives that we propose are simply those concepts that  nobody is naive enough to think that they are going to be the final answer,” Taylor said. “Certainly the board has not yet had an opportunity to look at them. They’re seeing this the same time the public is seeing this in terms of the draft scenarios."

He added once the public weighs in on the proposals, then he and his team can make suggestions to the board of supervisors who in turn will have more suggestions.

“It is our expectation that on June 14 we will have a board of supervisors first opportunity in a public session to look at it and we will hopefully get direction from them to come back on the June 28 meeting and be narrowed down to a preferred option,” Taylor said. “And then we will hold a public hearing at the end of July which would actually adopt the plan and at the same adopt a county ordinance putting it into effect.”