By a vote of 7 to 2, the Greensboro City Council approved a map created by District 3 Councilman Zack Matheny that redraws council districts following the addition of about 10,000 people to the city through a recent annexation action. The two dissenting votes to the Matheny plan came from District 1 Councilwoman Dianne Bellamy-Small and District 2 Councilwoman Goldie Wells, who represent the two majority-black districts on the east side of Greensboro.
The first time council members saw the map drawn up by Matheny, identified as Plan Q, was at the meeting last night. Eleven other plans were posted on the city’s website before the meeting and available for public review. All 12 plans are available for review here.
“It was very fast because we were voting on several things,” said Mayor Johnson, who joined the majority to approve the Matheny plan.
An earlier motion by Bellamy-Small to approve a map created by staff failed in a 4-5 vote. Joining Bellamy-Small and Wells were Mayor Yvonne Johnson and at-large Councilman Robbie Perkins. Matheny, Mayor Pro Tem Sandra Anderson Groat, at-large Councilwoman Mary Rakestraw, District 4 Councilman Mike Barber and District 5 Councilwoman Trudy Wade voted against it.
The Plan B map advocated by Bellamy-Small would have moved the Four Seasons Town Center from District 5 to District 1.
“District One does not have equity of economic development,” Bellamy-Small said. “[Plan B] would put Precinct 45, it would put the precinct with Four Seasons mall in District 1. Every other district would have what would be called economic generators.”
Matheny parried: “I tried to come up with a plan that did look at the whole city.” He said moving the mall from District 5 to District 1 was “just unfair.”
Redistricting goes into effect on June 30, 2008, in time for the 2009 municipal election. Assistant City Attorney Jerry Kontos said the 2010 Census requires district lines to be redrawn yet again and would be in effect in time for the 2011 election.
Voting with the majority to approve Plan Q gives Johnson and Perkins the power to make a motion later to reconsider the vote.
“I really voted on B; that’s the one I supported to begin with,” the mayor said. “I thought if I have to come back to this I have to be in a position to do so. I’m reconsidering, that’s true.”
Any redistricting plan ultimately green-lighted by the council requires the approval of the US Justice Department, as a result Section 5 of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which covers North Carolina and several other states in the old Confederacy.
Federal law requires that redistricting meet several conditions, including balancing populations, preserving majority-minority districts, minimizing the number of people reassigned to a new district, maintaining constituent relationships to incumbents, avoiding splitting up neighborhoods, compactness, maintaining contiguity and avoiding breaking up existing precincts. Under the federal law, smaller variances from the largest to the smallest districts are preferred.
The plan advocated by Bellamy-Small and narrowly defeated by the representatives of districts 3, 4 and 5, along with at-large members Sandra Anderson Groat and Mary Rakestraw, would have created a population variance of 3.7 percent and shifted only three precincts. Plan Q, which prevailed, creates a population variance of 6.5 percent and shifts 26 precincts.
Plan Q slightly increases the minority population of District 1 while reducing the minority population of District 2; Plan B slightly reduces the minority population of District 1 while making no change in District 2. Both plans maintain majority-minority status for the two eastern Greensboro districts.
In addition to handing Four Seasons Town Center to District 1, Plan B would have shifted two precincts in the Sunset Hills neighborhood from District 4 to District 5.
In comparison, Plan Q plunders two downtown precincts from districts 1 and 2 to the gain of Matheny’s District 3, and in return transfers three precincts in the Reedy Fork area that currently fall within District 3 to District 2, and moves a precinct that hugs the new Painter Boulevard from District 2 to District 1.
Plan Q also provides for a major swap between Districts 4 and 5. It moves a half-dozen precincts between Friendly Avenue and Interstate 40 from District 5 to District 4. In exchange, a swath of precincts west of New Garden Road around Piedmont Triad International Airport go to District 5. The effect is to give District 4 representative Barber a compact territory comprised of older, more stable neighborhoods, while District 5, which traditionally has the lowest voter turnout in the city, becomes a half-moon sliver stretching from the Grandover area to the newly-annexed Cardinal.
Mayor Johnson later said she holds reservations about Plan Q because of the number of precincts it would shift and because it would rob cultural assets from districts 1 and 2.
“One, Fisher Park would be taken out of District 2,” she said. “You don’t take a district that has very few assets and begin to chip away at those assets. I think downtown is an asset with the historical museum, Triad Stage and the children’s museum.”
Kontos told council the failed Plan B would likely receive less scrutiny from the feds, raising a protest from Matheny.
“Legally speaking, the Department of Justice looks at this and they take into account the totality of circumstances,” he said. “I’m not saying that Plan Q will not be approved, but I’m saying that Plan B has a better chance of being approved.”
Matheny interrupted Kontos, before council voted to approve the District 3 representative’s plan.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he said. “I would be careful.”
Kontos said today that his comments might have been misinterpreted.
“I’m not saying one plan is better than the other,” he said. “I was simply asked which one will receive less scrutiny. And my opinion is it is Plan B because those numerical variations are not as great.”
UPDATE, 9:41 p.m.:
Bellamy-Small is hot about the redistricting vote.
"If the Justice Department called me, I was going to tell them there's political power and there's economic power," she said. "District One is being denied economic power. What is the most anemic district when it comes to economic development? District One. Why? Ask yourself why."
Bellamy-Small said Matheny and Wells did not consult her and Wells about Plan Q.
"You have what I call 'the commissioners three and the followers two,'" she said about the majority that pushed through Plan Q. "They come in [to council chambers], and usually it's Mike who's leading the pack. They come in with their plan all ready, and they've talked about it among themselves, and we're trying to figure it out. It's not fair."
Rakestraw, for one, confirmed that Matheny enlisted her support for Plan Q ahead of the vote.
"Zack Matheny had asked if I would support the plan," she said. "Since I'm at-large I get everybody anyway.... He had painfully gone through this thing to make sure that he saw that the representation would be there for everybody. My concerns were few about it."
Rakestraw said she believes assigning part of the Cardinal to Wade will heal some of the bitterness by residents resentful of annexation.
"That's good because she's new and she didn't have anything to do with the annexation," Rakestraw said. "It will be a fresh start."
UPDATE, 2:05 p.m., Feb. 21, 2008:
Matheny weighs in. Taking part of his lunch break at the "Essentials of Government" seminar provided by the NC Institute of Government in High Point, the District 3 representative told me by phone that grabbing downtown was not a conscious move when he drew up the plan. He stressed that his primary considerations were "macro" while acknowledging some specific intent with regard to how neighborhoods and constituents are traded around.
Firstly, he doesn't think Plan B is fair, again, because it takes Four Seasons Town Center away from District 5.
Then there's the politically sensitive issue of the annexed Cardinal, many of whose residents resisted being absorbed within the city limits.
Matheny: "I don’t think it’s fair for the entire Cardinal to be in Mike Barber’s district, a former council member that voted on annexation. It’s a sensitive subject. If we can create something that’s fair for the new section so they feel good about their representation, we should. I’m looking out for the Cardinal."
Also, other plans besides Plan B would have transferred the Glenwood neighborhood from District 1 to District 5. Plan Q doesn't do that.
Matheny: "In Dianne’s case I wanted her to maintain all of Glenwood. She’s worked very hard for Glenwood, and she’s done a good job."
Many residents evidently feel the same. The president of the Greater Glenwood Neighborhood Association spoke in support of the neighborhood remaining within District 1 on Tuesday.
Contrary to Bellamy-Small's characterization of Plan Q's supporters as the "commissioners three and the followers two," Matheny said his enlistment of Rakestraw's support was more happenstance than typical practice. As new members of council, they've been in the "Essentials of Government" seminar together for more than a week.
Matheny expressed surprise at Bellamy-Small's assertion that the three new council members, along with Barber and Groat, don't consult with the other members, because he said he discussed his plan with her at a Food Not Bombs dinner at the downtown library on Monday night. (I was there, but did not overhear the conversation.)
Matheny: “After the dinner, I specifically said, ‘I have a plan. It will be on your desk.’ I said, ‘Dianne you’re probably not going to like it. Goldie, I don’t know if you’re going to like it. I’m taking Fisher Park from you. Dianne looked at me and said, ‘I’m going to put my Plan B, the Plan B drawn up by staff, out there. We’ll have a vote on it.
Matheny said he would consider giving Fisher Park back to Wells because in the interest of maintaining good council relations.
“Goldie probably has a couple neighborhoods which are her bread and butter," he said. "I have a couple neighborhoods that are my bread and butter. Glenwood would probably be Dianne’s bread and butter. Starmount is Mike Barber’s bread and butter. You have that core and then you expand from there.”
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