Santa Ana council picks new map to solve ward boundary confusion
New outlines for Santa Ana’s City Council wards should avoid a confusing 2020 election field the city was headed toward and will likely also level the playing field for the city’s Asian-American voters.
City officials have finally selected the new boundaries for the city’s six wards, which will kick off Santa Ana’s transition to by-district voting in two years.
Santa Ana has long been divided into wards, and the city charter requires candidates to live in a ward to be eligible to represent it on the council. But voters citywide have gotten to choose council members, something that will change in 2020 – the mayor will continue to be chosen by voters across the city.
As part of an agreement that settled a voting rights lawsuit, Santa Ana is switching to by-district voting, so council members will only be chosen by voters in their ward.
Supporters of district voting say it can help minority groups and other sometimes underrepresented communities elect their preferred candidates, and that council members may be more responsive to the needs of neighborhoods where they depend on winning votes.
Some say it can also open the opportunity to seek office to more people, because it’s less expensive and more manageable to campaign for a district of about 53,000 people than for a city of more than 330,000.
The council approved the new voting boundaries on Nov. 20 and will take a second, procedural vote on the changes Dec. 4.
The new map creates a district on the city’s west side that would have the biggest concentration of Asian-American voters, about 44 percent, which was one of the issues the lawsuit sought to address.
Council members had considered several map alternatives and looked poised to move forward with one that could have caused turmoil in 2020 by putting some council members into the same district and some seats on the ballot after council members had served just half a term.
Officials avoided that problem with the map they picked, except in one case. Cecilia “Ceci” Iglesias is set to become the new Ward 6 councilwoman once November’s election results are certified, but when the new boundaries take effect in 2020, she’ll live in a different ward that will be up for election that fall.
City Clerk Maria Huizar said Iglesias will have a choice: serve out a full four-year term as an at-large councilwoman or run in 2020 for election in the newly drawn ward. With more incumbents hitting term limits in 2020 and leaving the council, neither option would upset the council’s six-member structure, Huizar said.
Also as part of the lawsuit settlement, the city put the switch to by-district voting on the Nov. 6 ballot. It was approved by more than 63 percent of those who voted.