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The San Mateo County Board of Supervisors has approved new boundaries for supervisorial districts that will split Menlo Park into two districts.
The area of Menlo Park mostly west of El Caminio Real will be in District 3 and the rest of the city will be in District 4.
A staff report for the board states: “One often-mentioned community of interest request at the Committee hearings was to keep East Palo Alto, eastern Menlo Park, North Fair Oaks, and the bordering areas of Redwood City united in one district. All plans keep these areas united in District 4.”
Adopted unanimously by the board on Tuesday, the new map will govern elections for two board seats up for election in 2014: Districts 2 and 3.
The county described the new boundaries this way in a press release:
District 1: 147,020 residents: Millbrae, Burlingame, Hillsborough and the unincorporated San Mateo Highlands along with 71.9 percent of South San Francisco (mostly east of Junipero Sera Boulevard) and 74.6 percent of San Bruno (south of Sneath Lane and west of Interstate 280).
District 2: 151,033 residents: San Mateo, Foster City and 79.1 percent of Belmont.
District 3: 151,121 residents: Atherton, San Carlos, Pacifica, Half Moon Bay, Woodside, Portola Valley and 41.1 percent of Menlo Park (mostly west of El Camino) and the unincorporated communities of Emerald Lake Hills along with the coastside.
District 4: 142,903 residents: Redwood City, East Palo Alto and 58.9 percent of Menlo Park along with the unincorporated community of North Fair Oaks.
District 5: 143,991 residents: Brisbane, Colma, Daly City, 25.4 percent of San Bruno (northwest section of the city) and 28.1 percent of South San Francisco (west of Junipero Serra Boulevard) along with unincorporated Broadmoor.
“The map we selected takes into account the public input we received from every corner of San Mateo County,” said Don Horsley, president of the Board of Supervisors, in the press release. “We heard from many interests and we are pleased that we were able to select a map that limited the number of cities that would be divided while at the same time uniting communities.”
An advisory committee had recommended that the board consider maps called “Community Unity” and “Equity.” The adopted map, called “Community Unity B,” is a blend of the two maps, “adopting the recommendations of the ‘Equity’ coalition in the North County and the ‘Community Unity’ coalition in the South County,” the press release said.
The new map divides these cities between districts: Belmont (Districts 2 and 3), Menlo Park (Districts 3 and 4), San Bruno (Districts 1 and 5) and South San Francisco (Districts 1 and 5). (Belmont, South San Francisco and Redwood City were divided between districts in the existing map.)
The new map unifies Redwood City (the Redwood Shores area was in a separate district in the existing map).
This should be called the Dave Pine Plan. None of the 3 redistricting plans under consideration were chosen. At the last minute, Dave Pine working quietly behind the scenes to influence the Redistricting Committee to do some last minute gerrymandering District 1 to ensure his re-election.
You see if we had District voting instead of County voting in the last Board of Supervisors election Gina Papan would have been the District 1 Supervisor not Dave Pine. Dave Pine knew this and had to work to get his District reshaped to capture his supporters.
Unfortunately, the Gerrymandering of District 1 required the rest of the County to be rebalanced and this had the most adverse effect on Menlo Park. In redistricting the worst thing that can happen is for a city to be broken evenly into 2 districts. This ensures that the city has minimal influence in those districts while cities entirely within 1 district have maximum influence with regard to protecting the City’s interests at the County level.
What is ironic is that people like John Woodell and Kirsten Keith who worked tirelessly to get out the vote for Dave Pine got their city fractured. No good deed goes unpunished in Party politics.
All proposed maps split Menlo Park.
50-50 is always the worst solution. Emerald Lake Hills could have easily been put into District 4 and more of Menlo Park could have been put into District 3.
Menlo Park was only the residual effect of Dave Pine’s undue influence on the Board of Supervisors. When the Board of Supervisors puts re-electing one of its own over the good of the community then it is time to vote the bums out. All of them!
I think this is much more a Don Horsley, Carloe Groom & Adrienne Tissier Map,that I like to call the Service League of SMC Map…http://www.serviceleague.org/directors.html
Don Horsley from PADP, “The board decided to keep San Mateo together because Supervisor Groom was a city councilwoman there, and she wanted to represent the whole city.”
Isn’t that nice, Carole Groom was appointed to Supervisor when almost everybody in the County opposed it except Bill Nack and the Labor Union.
Someone has FINALLY revealed Woodell’s and Keith’s true reasons for trying to push their way into various campaigns under the guise of “volunteering,” “supporting,” and/or “helping.” Can you say “quid pro quo???” Thank goodness Dave Pine doesn’t feel that he’s beholden to Woodell and/or Keith, which says a lot about his character versus Woodell and Keith’s.
I hadn’t thought of these new district lines as weakening Keith’s political position. Woodell/Keith have done nothing “for the good of the community.” They only do things if it benefits them and wreak havoc as a result. Can you say “drama?” Candidates beware!
Thanks to all commenters for your views and information. Your comments have helped me determine who I will NOT be voting for. Thanks!!! ; )
Actually, plan B was chosen. https://twitter.com/warrenslocum/statuses/392748204829069312
It is unclear what Not Dave Pine is talking about here.
maps:
“Not Dave Pine” is rambling and doesn’t make sense because he/she is probably John Woodell but using an alias to post. The relevant point is that he and Keith have a quid pro quo mentality. Sooo, “Not Dave Pine” is not happy that Keith didn’t benefit from these new lines and felt that Keith should have been rewarded (by Pine) by empowering her with new district lines to more easily elect her to the board of supervisors because she and her husband worked on Pine’s campaign. How is that “for the good of the community,” as “Not Dave Pine” suggests? It is not.
The bigger question here is what does an alignment with Woodell/Keith mean for the community and other candidates? In this election cycle, there are a few campaigns Woodell is involved with:
1) MP Fire Board race, helping Carolyn Clarke and Jack Nelson. What has come of this? Clarke’s misleading representation that she is a CPA. Clarke has already confirmed that Woodell is helping her. Nelson has been so under the radar that I wonder if he even has a campaign going! We know that he can’t run a board meeting and that the union is pretty much funding his campaign.
2) Since I live near the RWC border, I understand from friends there that Woodell has been helping a council candidate for the RWC Council race. That candidate is Corrin Rankin. Rankin sued another candidate for using an incorrect ballot designation, instead of just talking to the candidate. She also sued the RWC City Clerk, and the city council had to settle. I’m sure this was to get publicity for Rankin, but again, it’s “drama!” Now, she has been sued twice in the last two weeks.
The common theme in all this is drama. I think Woodell and Keith, who seems to be (or pretends to be) oblivious to her husband’s activities, are constantly seeking attention for themselves or candidates they’re supporting.
The new maps are a smack down from the board of supervisors on Keith. Her act of camera mugging and aggressive behavior at every event has worn thin. It’s all about her, not the public.
I did not see a link to the District map. If you look at the map on the county page, Menlo Park is divided between the landlords and the tenants essentially. One does get the sense that East of El Camino in MP is being written off for future blight with all these specific plans and new units needed. I really feel sorry for the people who plunked down over a million dollars for new homes in the last 10 years between El Camino and 101 in Menlo Park, and the tenants who now have to pay on average $2000/mth for a one bedroom apartment. Remember, the old money west of ECR is paying the old property taxes due to Prop 13.
Good riddance should take note. The Almanac endorsement of Clarke in 2012 clearly describes her as an accountant http://www.almanacnews.com/print/story/2012/10/17/endorsements-clarke-mueller-for-menlo-park-council not a CPA. Clarke’s literature and smart voter page from that election http://www.smartvoter.org/2012/11/06/ca/sm/vote/clarke_c/ include the CPA society, which is accurate. Making this an issue now is simply an old fashioned lynching by people that never supported Clarke.
Good riddance has also proposed that people living on the border of Redwood City are telling their Menlo Park neighbors about Corrin Rankin. This is unlikely. The only people that would be gossiping about this are the candidates convinced Rankin is going to be elected over them. The only people that would be interested in such gossip are, well, the trolls that crave attention by posting here anonymously.
Whatever, Trolling!
I still stand by opinion that when Woodell/Keith are involved with anyone’s campaign, there is always drama. That includes Rankin at this point. Perhaps, Rankin’s campaign manager, Darcy Brown, feels compelled to do damage control and may also be posting anonymously.
As for anonymous postings, you would be in the same boat as would Woodell and Keith. You know what they say about glass houses.
The point is that the electorate are much better off now that Keith’s base has been diminished after these lines were drawn.
Rankin was just copying what Keith did when she sued Slocum. Copying a failed candidate was a poor decision and probably the result of bad advice. It might cost her the election. At least she did not put a billboard on 101.
Insider: Great point! At least Rankin does not have a billboard on wheels with her big image on it so that someone (probably Woodell) can “vandalize” it for media attention. Rankin would look interesting with a pirate’s patch over her eye, a blacked out tooth, and a tooth with a dollar sign on it.
“Copying a failed candidate was a poor decision and probably the result of bad advice”- well, Woodell is probably involved with Rankin’s campaign, but based on her filings, Darcy Brown’s firm City Strategies out of SF, is Rankin’s campaign “consultant.” I wonder if that’s where Rankin’s “bad advice” is coming from. But Rankin as the final say as the candidate. If she is making poor judgment calls during her campaign, think of how she would be as a RWC council member.
Regardless of how the district lines are drawn, Warren Slocum will be the District 4 supervisor or for as long as he wants the job.
Sold out. Guess it’s time to move.
What was the final outcome of the accusations that Woodell removed campaign yard signs of his wife’s opponents? I think one was Bernstein’s & there was another candidate too. I usually disregard Bernstein’s rants but he may have been correct in that instance. There were some interesting questions raised about the Woodell/Keith tactics.
Downtowner: you’ve almost got it right. I had forgotten about this situation with Woodell and him removing a campaign sign, so I looked it up. Seems like Woodell was supporting and working on a candidate’s campaign for the MP Fire Board. Bernstein had a sign up for Woodell’s candidate’s opponent. The sign was removed and tossed aside, and Woodell’s cell phone was found underneath it. Woodell sued Bernstein and Virginia Chang Kiraly (it was her campaign sign that Woodell removed), who was Woodell’s candidate’s opponent, for defamation. Who knows what happened exactly, but like you said, it does raise some “interesting questions” about Woodell/Keith’s tactics.
The main point is that whenever Woodell is involved in a campaign, you can be sure of a few things: 1) there might be some kind of lawsuit, 2) there will be some kind of misleading information from or misrepresentation by the candidate Woodell’s supporting, and 3) Keith will endorse Woodell’s candidates. And for what? To get publicity? To further Keith’s political career? If I were a candidate, I would not want this kind of publicity and unnecessary drama.
Hopefully Keith’s political career is over! That way, we won’t have to endure an entire campaign season of drama and Keith’s plastic smile plastered on all sorts of billboards.