Boston City Council, MA Redistricting, 31 Mar 2022

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From YouTube: Committee on Redistricting MEETING on March 31, 2022

Description

A meeting to hear public testimony regarding redistricting from residents of District 4, District 5, and District 6

A

Committee on redistricting I'm joined by my colleagues, uh counselor braden uh counselor warrell counselor lara uh councillor flaherty, uh let's see if I counselor louis jen. uh Let me just make sure I'm not missing anybody else.

A

uh That is the list. uh The public. This public meeting is being recorded. This is being live streamed at boston.gov city, council, tv and broadcast on xfinity channel 8, rcn channel 82 files channel 964.. This meeting is to hear public testimony regarding redistricting from just residents of district 4 district 5 and district 6.. If you are interested in testifying, please email, michelle.

A

At boston.gov I'll now turn it over to my council colleagues for some brief opening resources chair I'm going to allow counselors whose districts are the focus of today's meeting to go first uh starting with councillor lara, then council, royale and I'll go to the rest of my colleagues at uh councillor. Lara flor is yours. uh If you want any brief opening uh remarks about redistricting uh and redistricting, particularly in terms of your district, I also want to note that we've been joined by tanya fernandez anderson as well.

A

Counselor liar the floor is yours: if you want to give an opening.

A

Okay, councilworld, are you, uh are you ready and able to give an opening.

B

Yeah, thank you chair. um I'm just looking forward to um this process um just coming fresh off a campaign, you know the the dividing lines in our district, I feel, could be a lot more clearer um and I'm looking forward to you know creating more divide, more dividing lines in our district and pulling some of those streets. You know the certain streets that one side is district four, but the other side might be uh district three or district five um and just being able to pull those communities and those streets together.

B

So I'm looking forward to this process and I'm looking forward to hearing from the public to hearing their testimony. Thank you.

A

Thank you and if I can go now to vice chair, redistricting, uh counselor braden,.

C

um Thank you, mr chair, um I'm here to listen, um this district, the districts discussed tonight or not are not my districts, but, um as your co-chair, I want to be engaged in this process and learn the concerns of our constituents across the city. So thank you for your for your leadership.

A

Thank you, councillor, braden uh and now, uh if we can go to uh councillor flaherty, who will be followed by counselor louis jan, followed by councillor fernandez anderson councillor flaherty, the floor is yours.

A

uh Council louis jan.

D

Thank you, mr chair, um happy to be here this evening, as we talk about redistricting um just here, to listen uh to hear from my colleagues to hear from members of the public.

D

um It's really important that we try our best to keep communities of interest whole to keep uh make sure that we are um protecting the voting interests and voting rights and and building political power in communities of color so really excited to to hear from the public and and to hear how we can make sure that our our neighborhoods and our people get the representation that they deserve. So thank you for holding this uh meeting and um looking forward to listening.

A

Thank you uh and uh counselor fernandez anderson. If you have anything, you would like to add.

E

Thank you chair. um I have uh nothing much to say just uh happy to be here and looking forward to the process. Thank.

A

You thank you uh and I and I don't know counselor lara if you're uh good to go now or not. uh If you want to give an opening, uh the floor is yours to do so. Otherwise, we'll just proceed.

A

Okay, so we're just gonna go ahead and start uh if we can start with the with the slides.

A

One second.

A

Okay, perfect uh so we're here today to talk about redistricting this year uh and how that's going to go. uh So this is the second of our three district centered public listening listening sessions on uh 2022 redistricting, as I mentioned in the meeting opening, my name is counselor arroyo and I am the chair of the redistricting committee. If we go to the next slide,.

A

Okay, there we go uh so we have other important dates uh that we would like to make sure that everybody's aware of which is uh essentially the uh community republican sessions over the next few weeks, each focused on a set of districts tonight we'll be focusing on public testimony on districts. Four, five and six next week on april 7th we'll be focusing on districts, one two and nine. If you're not able to attend a session for your district, you can of course attend one of the other scheduled meetings or submit testimony. In writing.

A

These sessions are an opportunity for the public to express their concerns and priorities on the redistricting process. uh The redistricting process will will really start in earnest uh come summer of 2022 after the budget, so this is a chance for us to start to flag sort of community input earlier in the process, so that folks can be aware of it when we start to really engage in remaking the map and redistricting later this this year in the summer next slide. Please.

A

Redistricting is the process of drawing lines districts from which public officials are elected. The boston city council is responsible for this process. At the municipal level, districts are redrawn according to the 2020 census data and remain in place for 10 years until the next census data is collect is is while the next census is conducted. The next census data uh next batch of census data is available. The goal of redistricting is to reflect population changes and racial diversity uh within the population, uh and uh uh do I have you uh tonight candace you.

E

Do miss the chair? Yes,.

A

Thank you. I I just gotta access. I know councillor murphy is trying to join us as a panelist uh and if you can go to the next slide- and I just want to note that councilor murphy is joining us.

A

Thank you. Thank you. uh So the way that redistricting works or redistricts are districts are drawn or redrawn, rather with precincts as the smallest unit. uh So using the 2020 census data, the committee will work to redraw districts with equal populations. Our maps will need to avoid excessive deviation and population between districts, as well as follow rules set out by the voting rights act. Next slide. Please.

A

A

This is a sample breakdown of the population changes from 2010 to 2020., so here you can find the population uh deviations from when we took the census in 2020 and 2010 to when the census was most recently taken in 2020.. You can find these on the census website and also on our committee is redistricting website. If you can go to the next slide, please slide seven.

A

A

Thank you. uh Our committee will be hosting all of our hearings and working sessions virtually until further notice. We are committed to an open and transparent process, so all maps will be posted publicly for review and comment. uh Our redistricting website is officially live and includes dates and times for future public listening sessions and other resources and will be updated throughout the process and as future sessions. Future sessions are scheduled. It's www.boston.gov.

A

Departments, slash city council, slash, 2022, redistricting boston uh and with that we'll actually going to move on to our public testimony. The goal of these sessions is to really hear from the public about what they're hoping to see with redistricting uh our central staff has.

A

Let me know that there we have two people who have signed up today for public testimony, uh so please state your name in place of residence and make sure that your zoom profile name matches the name which you signed to testify, uh and and so we have liz crowley and helena tanj uh we'll take. uh So why don't we go ahead and call you both up?

A

Normally, I say two minutes, uh but you know due to the fact that there's only two people signed up today for testimony uh I'll, let you say your piece uh as long as you don't take ten minutes. I think we could get that done, uh and I also wanna just note that we've been joined by uh councilor murphy of council murphy. If you would like to say anything about the redistricting processor or anything on that front, you're free to give an open.

F

um Thank you no opening statement. Just thank you for that wonderful, introduction and explanation and happy to be on and listen to any questions that any of the panelists have. Thank you.

A

Thank you, uh and so I see that uh helena is present uh and so helena. If you, if you'd like to give your uh public comment, the floor is yours. Now.

E

Thank you very much. Councilor arroyo, um I'm holding the tongue with uh bell now family neighborhood association in high park massachusetts district. Five. um I was hoping to um provide testimony at the end of after receiving the information, so I'm not really prepared for beginning remarks, but thank you for hosting this hearing appreciate it.

A

Oh no, that is all the information, so just to be clear. We have no maps at this time to present and we won't until the summer. Essentially, the whole goal of this is just to make sure folks understand what the timeline is for the process, but also sometimes folks have questions about borders. Sometimes folks are literally one side of their street will be in one district. One side of the street will be in another or uh you know some goal or thing that they care about with redistricting the thing that makes them care about redistricting.

A

um Obviously I know you very well, uh and so, but I don't know what your, what your hopes and and and for the redistricting process are so if you have any hopes for the redistricting process and you'd like to share them now or any concerns for the redistricting process and you'd like to share them now now's the time.

A

But this is just a uh honestly a brief uh way to get in touch with the district and to start that preliminary work and make sure that, if there's any issues that we're not thinking about that, somebody in one of these districts would like to flag for us. They can. In the last session we had, which involved district 7, district, 8 and district 3.

A

uh folks were flagging. Sort of wanting to have their neighborhood whole having concerns about sort of feeling like because they're on one side of because they were in a precinct or two that was in a different district, for instance, mission hill.

A

In that case, they wanted to see some focus on that, um and there was, you know, essentially concerns about cracking or packing, which is cracking, which is when you sort of have a geographical density of a race or ethnicity or culture, and you sort of split it and weaken their political power and packing, which is when you have sort of a large number of that same thing. But you actually instead of uh splitting it.

A

We put it all in one district so that they're limited in their ability to have political influence, uh and so those things are are barred by law. But people bring up different issues like wanting to keep their neighborhood hole, or things like that. So I don't know if you have any similar concerns or anything you'd like to share. But now is the time for that.

E

Thank you so much, um I would say similar or like, but I would you know. I need to do a comparative analysis with the census data to see what it actually shows for uh the last data from 2020, um just to make sure that our neighborhood, you know, importantly stays whole.

E

I think, as neighborhood associations, we have pretty much done a good job as making sure there's equal representation or making sure all of our neighbors are represented in the neighborhood association.

E

But I think also we want that to be happening not only at the city level but at the state level as well, even though we know that that process is already completed. So thank you again for hosting these series of uh conversations and I look forward to future conversations and seeing you know, are there any changes? Will there be any changes and then having a broader input or, if necessary, at that time,.

A

And so uh just to answer sort of that one question: the the census website uh that's available, so that you can go look at that is actually on our city council committee website. So if you put boston city council, redistricting website, you can see that data, but the good news is. uh We should not be seeing much change at all in district five, because the population is so in line to where we are supposed to have it.

A

um Whereas say you know, district two is that thirteen thousand five hundred people over, I think we were 150 people over, uh and so our lines won't be changing much at all uh in district five. uh Due to that. So if you go to the redistricting website, uh you can see that information so I'll make sure to get you that as well, so that you can take a look at it I'll send you that.

E

Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

A

Thank you appreciate you taking the time tonight. um I don't know that we have anybody else who signed up uh for public comment here today right now, if we do uh or if you fail to email to sign up uh and can raise your hands that you can get called on, uh we will call on you so that we could do public comment.

A

So it looks like at the moment uh we've used all our public commenters who are available. I don't know if I would like to add anything if you would like to add anything or or have a question.

A

Please do raise your hand, otherwise the next one of these will be thursday next thursday, and if you have folks who talk to you about redistricting, you can tell them to reach out to you so that they can commit to that one, because, frankly, any questions anybody has about any part of the neighborhoods in the redistricting process are fair game at any of these hearings.

A

This is just make sure that the counselors who represent these districts are able to be at one specific one for certain, um but obviously counselors, as you can see, are also free to show up at all of these hearings uh in case something comes up that involves their districts because of the lines and because they're so fluid.

A

If you're a district counselor, it's very likely unless you know council, braden and myself will never be discussing our borders, but for most folks their districts are in the middle of the map and they have multiple districts that touch, and so it's always a conversation point, um and so with that I don't know if anybody wants to give an opening or make any say, I don't see but left for public comment. So what I'm gonna do is wait until seven, I'm gonna recess until 7 p.m.

A

So that we can hear their comment and otherwise we'll adjourn seven.

A

So I don't see any hands up, so why don't we go on recess until uh 7 p.m? Where, if somebody's here to comment we'll have them do public comment again? If you want to do public comment, it's uh an email to michelle uh m. I c h, e l, l e got a dot goldberg at boston.gov and we can. uh We can have you do public comment so we'll we'll wait till seven. If nobody signs up then we'll we'll adjourn. Thank you. We're on recent tests.

A

Okay, so I'm going to pull this out of recess here, it doesn't look like we have any new signups. uh Did you receive any new signups candice?

A

I did not know okay, so I'm going to go ahead and adjourn, but before I adjourn, I just want to thank all the counselors for attending, and I also want to just ask uh that for next week, which is the last one of these that you do uh help us make sure that we get folks who are actually concerned about this present in your districts.

A

So uh if you are able uh to help us get folks who are actually interested in the registration process and want to be heard on the registration process from your districts, uh regardless of what district that may be or if you're at large city-wide, that will be the last hearing we have for a while once the budget process is up, we're going to be limited in our ability to have hearings until the summer.

A

So if anybody is uh seeking to speak on redistricting period uh next week will be the last opportunity for a little bit uh for us to do that. So with that, I want to thank everybody for their participation and with their help uh in this, uh and I'm gonna go ahead and adjourn. Thank you. Everybody have a good night. Thank.

F

You bye good night.