The redistricting extravaganza at the board of supervisors July 12 meeting should have been billed as a circus attraction and not the accumulation of the new, user-friendly public working agreement that was supposed to be used in the redistricting process.
It is sad that the preamble to redistricting constantly expressed by all the county supervisors was that public input and participation was not only requested, but needed to create “fair and balanced” redistricting. The reality at the meeting was a repeat of what has been happening for many years; the majority of supervisors voted in their best interest,
not ours!
Lompoc and the North County continue to be the bastard stepchild of Santa Barbara County, even though the majority now lives in North County. Their insincerity was demonstrated by the little amount of time spent talking about our representation at this meeting after telling us all how wonderful it was to have 16 maps to choose from and all the public input. It was amazing to look into the faces of the South County supervisors as they voted to split Lompoc in two like an earthquake fault and keep their own districts intact as they have been in the past and explain there is no disparity!
I relished Supervisor Wolf’s deadpan face as she pushed to place the “mesa,” with only 900 people, where they wanted to be without objection, but Lompoc, with 43,000 people, was left to fend for themselves after bitterly complaining. The board had plenty of suggestions from the public but chose to ignore them. The economy is bad, government is running amok, money is tight, and our country leaders can’t get it right. Enough is enough.
Now is the time to let the public decide, place this important decision as a ballot initiative, and let us vote! Until that happens, please go to the next meeting and demand fair representation in all areas of our county districts. Most importantly, tell our supervisors they should relinquish the redistricting authority and responsibility as the law allows and give the D.A., controller, and school superintendent a chance to redistrict our county.
This article appears in Jul 21-28, 2011.