Millbrae switches to district elections, adopts map

The Millbrae City Council has chosen a district map, capping the city’s tumultuous move from at-large to district elections for City Council races.

In a 4-1 vote the council selected “Map G,” one of five arrangements with which the council had previously agreed to move forward out of several dozen maps submitted by community members. The city embarked on the switch last year to avoid potential litigation related to the California Voting Rights Act.

Under the new arrangement, voters will choose a single councilmember, who must also live within their district. Currently, the city’s entire population casts votes for all five councilmembers who rotate the mayor and vice mayor roles annually.

“We’re looking for the best alternative here, understanding that nobody’s happy about dividing up our city five ways,” Councilmember Anders Fung said ahead of the vote. “But it has to be done and it has to be done before March 1st.”

The deadline was imposed per the Voting Rights Act. The city last year received a letter that claimed the city was in violation of the law, alleging certain ethnic groups in the city had seen their votes “diluted” as a result of at-large elections and the effect is a council that does not represent the population’s ethnic makeup.

Given the difficulty involved with disproving the allegation, the city chose to not take the matter to court, which would likely have resulted in millions of dollars in fees. The law suggests cities form districts that group “communities of interests” to bolster their ability to elect preferred candidates. Those communities could be ethnic groups, those with similar socioeconomic standing or neighborhoods with common concerns like airport noise, traffic or flood risks.

The council, however, opted for a different approach. Councilmembers lauded that the chosen map divides both downtown and the area east of El Camino Real among three districts.

“To me it’s more diverse and more inclusive if you’re representing part of downtown, part of El Camino, and then it’s split up,” Vice Mayor Gina Papan said. “I’m hoping that this type of representation would make the councilmembers, as we are all supposed to be, a little more balanced in how things happen throughout the city.”

The majority of the city’s “Latino or Hispanic” population lives in the area east of El Camino Real and a higher percentage of renters live near the city’s downtown.

Out of the five maps previously selected, the chosen map most evenly splits “Hispanic or Latino” voters, with the percentage of voting age “Hispanic or Latino” residents not exceeding 13.1% for any district, according to census figures. Other maps had districts with as much as 17% of the voting age population identifying as “Hispanic or Latino.” Like all maps put forward, the chosen map creates a majority Asian district, with 55% of District 5’s voter age population identifying as such.

The city of just more than 22,000 — encompassing roughly 3 square miles — is nearly half Asian, 40% white, 11% “Hispanic or Latino” and 1% Black. The five-member council is majority white with one Asian member.

Fung said splitting the area east of El Camino Real granted residents there “three unique opportunities to elect leaders to represent our city,” and went on to say the map keeps “most of our communities of interest together.” Councilmember Reuben Holober indicated his support was based also on the map having “multiple districts that touch the downtown and El Camino corridor” and as well as its ability to “integrate neighborhoods in Millbrae together.”

Mayor Anne Oliva said she supported Map G for the reasons her peers had described.

Providing a dissenting vote, Councilmember Ann Schneider said she preferred instead a map not included among the five maps the council had opted to move forward with in its previous meeting, citing that they all divided the Highlands neighborhood in which she lives.

“To me that means that poor little neighborhood that has been so ignored will again continue to be ignored,” she said, adding that her preferred map best kept the city’s neighborhoods together. She also expressed frustration that the process was being rushed, at one point exclaiming that the council was “deciding 10 years of stuff based on six goddamn minutes.”

The district map will remain in place for a decade, redrawn corresponding with the release of new census data. Per state law, the city was required to hold a minimum of five public hearings to formulate maps. This week’s meeting was the seventh.

During the meeting Feb. 22, the council also chose which districts will be first up in the city’s split election cycle. District 2 and District 4, which have no councilmembers living within their boundaries, will be up first up, to be decided with this year’s election.

The map puts Oliva and Papan together in District 1. Oliva will be termed out in 2022, as will Holober; they could choose to run again in 2024 after taking a two-year break. Schneider and Holober both live in District 3, and Fung lives in District 5.

Those wishing to run for a district seat will need to have lived within that district for at least 30 days prior to filing to run.

Schneider insinuated the chosen maps leaves prior councilmember Wayne Lee with an open seat to fill this year by “gerrymandering District 2” while boxing out You You Xue, who previously sought a council seat but was narrowly defeated.

Members of the public who commented on the issue largely voiced support for other possible maps or expressed concern with the map chosen.

Michael Kelly, the co-founder of the Millbrae Anti-Racist Coalition, said the map “dilutes the Hispanic vote,” and seemed “to be counter to what this whole community of interest approach is supposed to be.”

corey@smdailyjournal.com

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