(Seguin) — The redistricting process is about to begin in the city of Seguin. The city needs to redraw its city council districts based on the results of the 2020 Census.
City Attorney Andy Quittner says the Census showed that the city grew to just shy of 30,000 people. He says they actually believe that the city was undercounted by at least 10-percent, but he says the growth is still clearly here. He says more homes are going up, which means more people are moving into the city.
“This year, we have had 940 permits for single family houses so far this year and 60 for duplexes which is another 120 units. The majority of those are in Districts 1, 3 and 6 which are already out of balance with the others because part of it, you want the largest district and the smallest district not to vary by more than 10 percent of the total population for the districts when you divide the districts by eight,” said Quittner.
The growth means that some of the boundary lines for the city council districts will have to shift to bring balance to each district, while also making sure that a number of key factors are also followed during this redistricting. Quittner says it starts with the formation of a Redistricting Committee, and then establishing some guidelines for the committee to follow.
“What we are doing now is to put together the committee, set out all the terms for the criteria of that which will include following geographical boundaries when it’s possible, communities of interest – you want to keep them together. The districts should be composed of whole voting districts and that’s why we wait until the county is finished because now, we can look at that. Whether that is as important as it used to be is probably arguable. I think people like that but now that we do Voting Centers where you can go anywhere in the county and vote for any district, it is probably a little bit of less importance than it used to be. Of course, you have to recognize the existing districts. They need to be relatively equally. As I said, the plus or minus 10 percent and you want them contiguous and compact. You don’t want the extent possible. Now, some of these like eight you see, doesn’t look contiguous and compact but then you have to look at what the city limits is because the city limits out there is kind of in a stretch and some of these are going to start swelling so that they’ll be fatter and more compact looking but you don’t want a piece of a district here and then another district and then that same district in the same place so that it’s broken up,” said Quittner.
The council on Tuesday appointed a five-member redistricting committee. The committee members include Warren Nossaman, Paul Castillo, Jessie Trinidad, Charon Miller, and Tony Tolic.
Quittner says they are accepting proposals from firms that would like to assist the committee with the redistricting process. He says those proposals will also be received and reviewed soon. He expects to present a recommended firm to the council during one of its meetings next month.
