County Board Rejects Plans to Alter Districts

Rejecting half a dozen proposals to carve up their voting districts, Ventura County supervisors on Tuesday directed county staff to develop different ideas for redrawing district boundaries.

The goal is to create five new supervisorial districts that divide the county population of 753,197 into roughly equal portions--a task complicated by both geography and politics. Census figures from 2000 show that three of the five existing districts are too large. Recognizing that boundary changes could affect their chances for reelection, supervisors said they were reluctant to give up any constituents.

“I hate to lose any of my district,” said Supervisor John Flynn, who serves an area that includes Oxnard and El Rio and has about 10,000 too many people. “It feels like a divorce.”

Supervisors can consider political parties, but cannot draw boundaries based on ethnicity. They also can make redistricting decisions based on geography, topography and a community’s shared interests.

Shared interest was the motivation for a coalition of Somis residents, who kicked off Tuesday’s debate by asking to be removed from Supervisor Judy Mikels’ 4th District and united with the rest of Las Posas Valley. They presented a petition to the board and argued that Somis should be in a more agriculture-friendly district.

“The Las Posas Valley has very little in common with Simi Valley,” said Brett Tibbitts, a Somis lawyer. “I hope you will take this opportunity to bring agriculture together.”

Port Hueneme residents asked to be moved into Flynn’s 5th District, which includes much of neighboring Oxnard. Sheryl Malone has lived in Port Hueneme for 25 years and said her community should be separated from the more distant Thousand Oaks, where residents have higher incomes and different concerns.

“I think we haven’t been represented well,” Malone said.

Federal law requires supervisors to shift their district boundaries once a decade. The board will discuss new proposals at its June 5 meeting, and must complete redistricting by July 24.

Supervisor Steve Bennett of the 1st District said he wants to ensure that each district includes both cities and unincorporated areas of the county. He also emphasized the need to involve county residents in the redistricting process.

“No matter what we do, we will balkanize some communities,” Bennett said.

The supervisors disagreed on whether to divide cities. Currently, the county’s two most populous cities, Oxnard and Thousand Oaks, are covered by more than one supervisor. Some argued that cities are better represented when they have two or more voices on the board, while others said some constituents may not know whom to call if there is more than one supervisor for their city.

A community task force presented two additional redistricting map proposals to the board, saying its top priority is to keep compatible neighborhoods together. Karl Lawson, task force director, proposed placing all of the Conejo Valley--Thousand Oaks, Newbury Park, Oak Park--into one district, and bringing together Somis with the Las Posas Valley.

“We want to ensure that communities with similar interests have a legitimate political voice,” said Lawson, a Camarillo resident.

John Hatcher, head of Ventura County’s NAACP chapter, urged the supervisors to keep in mind that people of color in the county need strong representation. “Whatever boundaries you draw, those boundaries should ensure that we are not left out of the loop.”

The supervisors did not make any decisions on either Somis or Port Hueneme, but Mikels said she does not want to give up Somis. The supervisors voted, however, to assemble parts of the county in sections that they will move around like game pieces until they can agree on final boundaries.

The board united Ojai, its neighboring towns and the coast north of Ventura as one group, but divided the east Oxnard Plain--which includes the new Cal State campus in Camarillo--into two sections.

They agreed to keep El Rio with Oxnard and to unite Nyeland Acres with El Rio. Those areas will likely stay in the 5th District. They also informally voted to keep together Ahmanson Ranch and Bell Canyon, which are in Frank Schillo’s District 2.

Tom Berg, who prepared the maps and presented them to supervisors, said the board made progress by deciding which communities should be grouped together. But he said supervisors and county staff still have a lot of work ahead.

“We are essentially beginning the game,” said Berg, director of the Resources Management Agency, which oversees the county’s planning and environmental health departments. “And we’ll go on from here.”