King City moving forward with district elections

Equal representation is the goal behind a move in King City to district elections. Some residents said they want city leaders to reflect the mostly Hispanic population.

“We are not changing the number of representatives, it’s just that each district will then elect a representative,” said Karen Jernigan, Mayor Pro Tem.

The change from at-large to district elections was approved in February by the city council and now it’s about the details.

On Monday, the city hosted one of three public meetings to hear from the community. On display were three maps showing different ways to break up the city into districts. All five districts have to have the same number of people.

“They are all fairly similar at least on the west side because there’s one census block, which is the basic population unit that has over 1,200 people in it, so it’s half a district all by itself. But in the middle and in the eastern side of town there’s a lot of variation in how the maps move around,” said demographer Douglas Johnson.

The idea came up over a year ago as a way to bring diversity to the council. Johnson said Salinas made the change years ago and now many other small California cities are doing the same.

“It’s becoming much more common. Dixon and Patterson up north from here are not much bigger and they are both making the same change,” said Johnson.

The city wants to have the lines finalized before November, which means a council decision must be made by early June.

“I’m not sure there’s really a right or wrong way to draw the maps. It’s what the people of King City want,” said Jernigan.