How communities within the Los Angeles Unified School District will be represented is now in the hands of the Los Angeles City Council, which has begun deliberations on a proposed redistricting map after a commission tasked with redrawing the political boundaries for the individual board districts forwarded a controversial map that was approved by a split vote.
Over the past two decades, and again in the latest map recommended by the commission, communities in East and Southeast L.A. have been placed in different districts in such a way that the residents — who largely come from working-class, immigrant families and who otherwise share much in common — have been pitted against each other.
Luis Sanchez, chair of the LAUSD Redistricting Commission, said in a statement at the time the commission forwarded a final map recommendation and report to the council that the advisory body believes the map “delivers on the promise to ensure that all families, regardless of economic or social challenges, are fairly represented.”
“Redistricting Commissioners heard from members of the public who advocated to ensure that the new districts reflect their communities’ school feeder patterns, ethnic diversity and demographic fluctuations,” Sanchez said. “From families in South Los Angeles to the Southeast cities, and Unincorporated East Los Angeles, to the San Fernando Valley, each community will have fair and equitable representation.”
District 2 v. District 5
But the map forwarded to the City Council was approved by a split vote, signaling unresolved issues.
Throughout the course of several commission meetings last month, the potential impacts of redistricting on the communities of East and Southeast L.A. made up the lion’s share of the discussions.
Residents and community organizers representing eastside neighborhoods such as Boyle Heights, Lincoln Heights, City Terrace and East L.A. urged commissioners not to consider maps that would lump them with voters in Northeast L.A. They feared such a move would dilute their political strength and undo a decade’s worth of progress resulting from eastside residents banding together to advocate for improvements to their schools.
In the end, the commission voted 8-5 for a map that would keep District 2 in a configuration that loosely resembles how it looks today, though the district as a whole would shift east. District 2 is represented by school board member Monica Garcia, who is termed out and can’t seek reelection next year.
By not making more drastic changes to District 2, however, the commission’s recommended map remains an issue for those living in Southeast L.A., in communities such as Huntington Park, Bell, Maywood and Cudahy. For the past two decades, residents in these communities have felt cut off from those living in Northeast L.A. — with whom they share the same school board representative — because District 2 largely divides the northern and southern parts of District 5.
School board member Jackie Goldberg, who represents District 5, lives in the northern half of the district, but residents in the Southeast say they have little in common with more affluent folks in northeastern neighborhoods such as Eagle Rock or Glassell Park.
Additionally, Southeast residents who spoke during recent commission meetings expressed frustration that because there is greater voter turnout in the Northeast, residents in Southeast L.A. have not been able to elect a candidate of their choice.
“We are tired of being taken over by other communities,” Cesar Zaldivar Motts, executive director of NewStart Housing Corp., an organization in Huntington Park that works to provide affordable housing to low-income seniors and families, told commissioners during a recent meeting.
‘Unfortunate’ pitting of two Latino communities
Huntington Park Mayor Graciela Ortiz said in an interview that in an ideal world, the residents of East and Southeast L.A. would be in the same district, as both are comprised of working-class, immigrant families with shared interests. However, she said some commissioners told her they had to keep the East and Southeast communities separate to balance out the Latino populations in Districts 2 and 5.
“It’s really unfortunate that two strong, working-class Latino communities needed to advocate to either keep a voice (in District 2) or to get a voice (in District 5) on the school board when other districts were untouched,” Ortiz said. “It was two Latino communities pitted against each other.”
Ortiz added that while the commission recommended creating more districts in the future, which could address the issues facing Southeast L.A. residents, “we don’t want the children in our community to wait another decade to have somebody represent them.”
While voters in southeast L.A. have raised concerns about being disenfranchised, the redistricting commission noted in its report to the City Council that, as with District 6, the recommended configurations for districts 2 and 5 would “continue to afford the Latino community an equal opportunity to elect candidates of their choice,” as the Latino citizen voting age population and percentage of registered Latino voters would continue to represent more than 50% in each district.
Similarly, District 1, represented by board member George McKenna, would remain a stronghold for Black voters, with the Black citizen voting age population increasing slightly in representation, going from 39.52% to 39.87% under the recommended map. District 1 includes neighborhoods in South L.A., such as Crenshaw and Exposition Park.
The commission, the report said, did “not seek to ‘create’ majority-minority Board of Education Districts, but instead chose to not radically alter the current configuration of … Districts to reduce such districts or create different ones.”
“In this respect,” the report states, “the Recommended Plan simply reflects the ongoing demographics changes in the School District.”
Keeping attendance zones together
In addition to balancing the number of people in each district and attempts to keep communities with common interests together, the commission was tasked with making good-faith attempts not split up high school attendance areas.
Based on the recommended map, the number of high school attendance zones that are split between two or more board districts would decrease from 27 to 15. LAUSD has 85 high school attendance zones in all.
To avoid having to continue splitting up some high school attendance zones, the proposed map would place all of the East Valley High School attendance area into District 6, currently represented by school board President Kelly Gonez. Meanwhile, the Van Nuys High School attendance area would be represented by District 3 board member Scott Schmerelson while the Reseda High School zone would fall entirely into District 4, represented by board Vice President Nick Melvoin.
District 4 would also include all of the Taft High School attendance zone, as well as the community of Encino south of Highway 101, including all of the Portola Middle School zone.
In the South, similar considerations were given to the city of Gardena and Gardena High School, which, under the recommended map, have all been shifted into District 7, represented by board member Tanya Ortiz Franklin. The city and the Gardena High attendance zone are currently divided between Districts 1 and 7.
Increasing the number of districts?
With an estimated 4.66 million people residing within LAUSD, the seven officials currently elected to serve on the school board should each represent, on average, about 666,000 people, a herculean — and some might say impossible — task.
To remedy that, the commission has recommended increasing the number of board districts within L.A. Unified in the future so that communities can feel they’re better represented.
Ultimately, it’s the City Council that has final say in how the map is redrawn and whether to take up any of the commission’s other recommendations. To be clear, though, increasing the number of board districts in future maps would require a voter-approved amendment to the city’s charter, as would another recommendation by the commission to make that body an independent one.
The commission has recommended that voters be asked to amend the city’s charter to require an independent commission the next time redistricting occurs in 2031, rather than continue with a body made up of political appointees.
The current LAUSD redistricting commission started with 15 members handpicked by elected officials — four appointed by Mayor Eric Garcetti, another four appointed by City Council President Nury Martinez and one each chosen by LAUSD’s seven school board members — though two commissioners later resigned.
A commission that worked on redrawing the City Council map has similarly recommended increasing the number of districts and moving to an independent commission when it comes to future City Council redistricting efforts.
In the meantime, a City Council ad hoc committee met Friday, Nov. 5, to discuss the city and LAUSD redistricting maps. The full council is scheduled to receive the ad hoc committee’s recommendations next Tuesday, ahead of public hearings set for Nov. 10 and 23. The council is expected to adopt a final map next month.
