Turlock Unified School Board Approves School Board Zone Map
The Turlock Unified School District administrative office is pictured Thursday, August 6, 2020.
The Turlock Unified School District Board on Tuesday night approved a map that changes the geographic areas each trustee represents to reflect updated population numbers.
The redistricting process is required every 10 years to coincide with the US census. The goal is to create areas with roughly equal populations and fairly represent voting groups.
Turlock School officials publicly reviewed three maps over three months and received feedback from administrators and community members.
“I’m very pleased with the transparency with which we were able to conduct this,” Deputy Superintendent Barney Gordon III said during the meeting.
The approved map changes Zone 7’s voting-age population from 49.89% Hispanic to 51.27% Hispanic and has another zone in which the majority voting-age population is made up of minorities, according to the district.
One administrator, Daniel Benedict, voted no. Benoît, who represents Zone 5, did not comment on the reason for his vote during the meeting. In an email to The Modesto Bee, Benedict said he was “not obligated to vote for redistricting” because the existing map complied with state and federal regulations.
However, he said there was “nothing wrong” with the board-approved map and that he “will fully support the will of the board”.
“There have been many distractions and disruptions over the past two years, and I don’t want my ‘No’ vote to add to that,” Benedict said via email. “I hope we can continue to focus on our work of raising our children.”
Director elections in November
Four trustee seats are up for filling in November: zones two, three, four and six, according to the terms listed on the school board‘s website. Trustees must reside in the district they represent.
Although all zone boundaries have been affected by the redistricting, each administrator will remain within their zone number, spokeswoman Marie Russell said in an email. The new map does not change who is running for office in November, Russell said.
Trustee Anthony Silva asked how many people would have been eligible to vote in this year’s election under the previous map, but would no longer be in an area with a trustee election under the new map. Gordon responded that the consultant the district had worked with said the issue was complex and he was unable to prepare this information.
Silva also asked if there were any groups the board wouldn’t accommodate with the new map.
“There’s no way to draw cards that meet all the requirements that appeal to everyone in the community equally, unfortunately,” Gordon replied.
Most of the feedback received by district officials focused on tightening boundaries, keeping communities together, creating majority-minority districts and conducting the process with transparency, Gordon said.
A demographic consulting firm helped the district prepare maps to meet legal requirements and reflect feedback. Gordon said 80 people voted on a card in an online poll and 71 of them preferred the council-approved card.
Since the school district is diving into Merced County, the map is now being passed to Stanislaus County and Merced County School Superintendents, pursuant to a resolution approving the map. Election offices in Stanislaus and Merced can make minor adjustments to the map if needed for the November election, according to the resolution.
Trust Areas 4 and 7 extend into Merced County, Russell said via email.
The map and the resolution can be found in point XII.A. on the agenda for the February 15 meeting.
