Santa Barbara County had its first-ever independent redistricting process last year where the final map was adopted by a commission, not the Board of Supervisors members whose districts are being drawn.
The final map will be used for the next decade, starting with June’s county primary election.
Now, the redistricting commission wants feedback on the process, from commissioner selection to the map-drawing tools to public outreach.
Online surveys are available for telling the commission what worked well and what could be improved for the 2030 redistricting process. The feedback will be used in a report presented to the Board of Supervisors and the public, and responses are being accepted through 5 p.m. March 5. Responses can be anonymous, or people can choose to share their names.
The English-language survey is available here: surveymonkey.com/r/J3HR3CT
The Spanish-language survey is available here: surveymonkey.com/r/YK7K88R
Scroll down to participate in a Noozhawk reader survey of the redistricting process. Your responses may be used in a news analysis story of the 2020 independent redistricting process.
Voters supported a 2018 ballot measure that created the Santa Barbara County Citizens Independent Redistricting Commission.
The members of that commission were selected by random drawing of the applicant pool for the first few, and those original members chose the rest of their 11-member group.
Five members resigned their spots, and replacements were chosen by the other commissioners.
In late 2021, the redistricting commission gave itself a very tight schedule of one month to review draft maps, choose a final map and adopt it.
Commissioners chose “focus maps” from the 100-plus draft maps submitted by members of the public and community groups, and then created their own proposed final map with different boundaries than any of the submitted maps.
That map was modified at the next meeting and adopted two days before the Dec. 15 deadline.
The quick review process was partially blamed on late U.S. Census Bureau population numbers, which are used to draw districts with a similar number of residents.
At the Dec. 11 meeting, commission chair Glenn Morris said the group will be meeting again in early 2022 to gather suggestions from the public on how the redistricting process could be improved, “while they’re still fresh in our minds.”
No public meeting date was listed on the commission schedule page as of Thursday.
— Noozhawk managing editor Giana Magnoli can be reached at gmagnoli@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.