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Last week, the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to approve new district election boundaries that, for the most part, preserve the existing lines drawn in 2013 when the county first switched to district elections. The decision disappointed groups lobbying for alternate district boundaries.
From late August through October, a 15-member commission appointed by the Board of Supervisors held a series of 10 meetings to discuss and collect public input about where the district lines should be drawn, according to county staff. That commission approved two maps: the “Unity” map, supported by an alliance of local nonprofits; and the “Espinoza” map, submitted by Rudy Espinoza, an advisory commissioner from Redwood City, to send to the Board of Supervisors. Both of those proposed maps would have put all of Menlo Park into District 4.
However, the board ultimately voted unanimously Dec. 7 and then again on Dec. 14 to finalize approval of a different set of boundaries, called the “Communities Together” map, leaving most of the districts intact, but with a few minor boundary shifts based on the changing demographics of the existing districts as found in the 2020 U.S. census.
The new boundaries
The new boundaries place more of Belmont into District 3 and part of San Bruno west of I-280 is now in District 5, while the northern boundary of District 1 shifted slightly north into District 5. In addition, two new unincorporated areas were added to District 4 from District 3: the Sequoia Tract, which is bounded by Woodside, Atherton and Redwood City along Woodside Road, and the Menlo Oaks neighborhood between Atherton and Menlo Park.
District 1 includes South San Francisco, part of San Bruno, Millbrae, Burlingame, Hillsborough, and some unincorporated areas.
District 2 includes San Mateo, Foster City and most of Belmont.
District 3 covers most of the Coastside, including Pacifica, Montara, Half Moon Bay and El Granada, as well as San Carlos, Woodside, Portola Valley, Ladera, Atherton, part of Belmont and Menlo Park west of El Camino Real.
District 4 covers Redwood City, North Fair Oaks, East Palo Alto and Menlo Park east of El Camino Real.
District 5 covers the northernmost part of the county, including Daly City, Broadmoor, Colma, Brisbane and part of San Bruno.
The population isn’t split exactly five ways between the districts – they range from 147,541 people in District 1 to 158,480 in District 2 – but vary by no more than 3.6% from the ideal five-way split, according to demographic data released with the map.
The demographic details of residents in each district also vary significantly. For instance, District 3, which includes most of the communities in The Almanac’s coverage area, contains the highest proportion of households with $200,000+ incomes, homeowners, and single-family homes. It’s also the oldest district, with more than a quarter of all residents over the age of 60. Three in five residents are white, substantially more than in other districts, and 4 in 5 people who voted in the district in 2020 are white.
District 4, which includes Menlo Park east of El Camino Real, has the highest proportion of Hispanic residents, at 43% of the overall population of the district, and the highest proportion of residents who speak Spanish at home, at 37%. It’s also the youngest district, with about a quarter of its population 19 years old or younger and only 16% of its population over 60. There’s also roughly a 50-50 split between renters and homeowners.
Challenges with drawing new boundaries
One challenge with the redistricting process was a significant delay in when the federal U.S. Census Bureau data was released for communities to begin drawing up district boundaries. According to Board of Supervisors President David Canepa, who represents District 5,the demographic data sets for redistricting were supposed to be released in the spring but weren’t made public until late September. Yet the deadline to approve the new boundaries, set at Dec. 15, remained unchanged, he said.
In hearings held in the weeks leading up to the final approval, groups formed in favor of other proposed boundaries. Specifically, a number of primarily nonprofits and individuals around the county teamed up in support of one proposed set of district boundaries called the “Unity” map.
Two adjusted versions of that map were ultimately brought forward to the supervisors, one placing all of San Bruno into District 1 and another that aimed to balance out the population between districts from that change, but it was still unbalanced when the supervisors discussed the matter on Nov. 16, according to Canepa.
The “Communities Together” map “preserves largely the same communities” as the current boundaries, according to Douglas Johnson of the National Demographics Corporation, the firm the county has contracted with to lead the redistricting process.
Supervisors rejected one of the favored map proposals, called the “Espinoza” map, because it would have taken Pacifica out of District 3, which covers the rest of the Coastside. It also would have placed East Palo Alto and the rest of Menlo Park into District 3.
Pacifica residents, District 3 Supervisor Don Horsley said, make up “a coastal community and have much in common with the rest of the coast.”
The Unity map would have put all of Menlo Park in District 4, which is currently represented by Supervisor Warren Slocum, along with Redwood City, East Palo and North Fair Oaks, among other changes.
“It seems that you are disregarding the public input that you put money and time into asking for,” said Julie Shanson of the Menlo Park group Belle Haven Action, which also supported the Unity map. “It seems that you are going with a map that had zero public support in any of the public comments, and disregarding the public support you heard for both of the other maps,” she told the Board of Supervisors at a Dec. 7 hearing before the supervisors approved the Communities Together map.
“We would like to express our disappointment in the process leading to the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors pending decision to adopt the minimal intervention map for its 2022 district boundaries,” said Margaret Lukens, president of the League of Women Voters of North and Central San Mateo County. “This process allows the board members to choose their constituents rather than enabling the county’s constituents to choose their representatives.”
Horsley pushed back, saying Dec. 7 that four of the current county supervisors are expected to be termed out in the next two election cycles. “Four of us are not running for reelection … so we are not determining our own electorate,” he said.
There had also not been a clear majority decision within the commission about which map should be selected, he noted. The two maps that the county’s advisory redistricting commission put forward were approved on an 8-7 vote, and the Communities Together map had failed on a 7-8 vote, he said.
Canepa said that the new boundaries provide a clearer pathway for minority voters to elect their preferred supervisor than the other alternatives provided. In the Communities Together map, only one district has a substantially majority-white population (District 3, with a 72% non-Hispanic white population), while the Unity map proposed two districts with a substantially majority-white population (districts 2 and 3, each with 63% non-Hispanic white populations).
“I think if you look closely at the voter registration numbers and voter turnout, you’ll see huge disparities in the general population – those who are registered to vote and those who actually do vote. That to me is a bigger issue when we talk about the future of bringing diversity and equity into the board,” he said. “Based on the data it shows me, the Communities Together map paves a greater path forward for people of color to join the Board of Supervisors, and therefore I have to recommend it.”
“We need to do much better job of registering voters,” Horsley added. “It’s not the maps, it’s the registered voters that make the difference.”
Still, San Mateo County’s track record for getting minority candidates elected to the Board of Supervisors isn’t a very strong one – only two non-white supervisors have been elected to the board in over 60 years, according to a 2013 KQED article.
“Two non-white supervisors over 60 years is not equity,” Belle Haven resident Pam Jones told the supervisors. “We were intelligent enough to elect you; we certainly were intelligent enough to recommend maps to you that reflected the will of the people.”
Go to is.gd/smcmap2020 to access an interactive map of the new district boundaries.
