LBUSD Board wants more public input on redistricting, will select new map on Dec. 1

During a special meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 3, the Long Beach Unified School District (LBUSD) Board of Education reviewed three redistricting map options and discussed how to get more public feedback before it has to decide on a final map by Dec. 1.

The board has been discussing redistricting since September when official 2020 census data came out showing population imbalances among the district’s five board representation areas.

LBUSD is divided into five areas across Long Beach, Lakewood, Signal Hill, and Avalon on Catalina Island, each with one elected board member. According to federal law under the 1965 Voting Rights Act, each area must have the same voting population within a 10% margin.

Though LBUSD has been seeking public input since last month, it has only received 84 community responses to the three map options as of Wednesday. 

Justin Rich, senior director of Cooperative Strategies, a demographic research firm LBUSD hired to help with redistricting, said the three maps show different scenarios for how to balance voting populations across the five district areas. 

In redrawing lines, the map scenarios take into consideration “communities of interest” survey results identifying neighborhoods with common social and economic concerns, Rich said. 

The maps also consider geographic boundaries that define neighborhoods and avoid disrupting voting blocks of ethnic subgroups so they can continue to “vote with a single voice,” he added. 

Areas 1, 2 and 3 have the highest pluralities of Hispanic voters on all three board maps, as they do currently, Rich said.  

In Map Scenario 1, Signal Hill is divided across two areas, with its northwest portion in Area 2 and the rest in its current Area 4, which covers the southeast side of the district. 

Map Scenario 2 moves all of Signal Hill to Area 2 from its current Area 4, along with the Willow Springs area of Long Beach. It also moves the Los Altos South and Stearns Park areas of Long Beach from Area 5 south to Area 4. 

Map Scenario 3 moves the California Heights neighborhood from Area 1 in North Long Beach to Area 2 in West Long Beach, which also gets the northwest portion of Signal Hill and the Willow Springs area. Los Altos South moves from Area 5 to Area 4 in that scenario.

The Willmore and St. Mary’s areas of Long Beach—currently in Area 3 in southwest Long Beach, bordering Area 2—fluctuate in each of the three map scenarios in terms of which of those two areas they would be in.

Rich emphasized that the maps only reflect which school board member represents an area and not which school a child attends.  

“The home schools for students currently will not change with any of these maps,” he said. “Redistricting is solely about board of education areas for elections for board representation.”

District seeks public input via its website; Benitez says it’s not enough

The district has made efforts to engage the public on board redistricting through community meetings, including two upcoming virtual meetings on Nov. 8 and Nov. 15 at 6 p.m., according to Justin Grayson, LBUSD’s chief communications and community engagement officer. 

LBUSD also recently made its map options more accessible and readable via its website at lbschools.net/redistricting. Viewers can roll over the current color-coded board area map and the three new map options to readily see which neighborhoods would be impacted in each scenario. 

Clicking on each map also leads viewers to tables with census population data, including ethnic subgroups, and how those groups are impacted by each option.

The webpage features prominently placed red buttons—in English and Spanish—the public can click on to offer opinions on each map.  

Of the 84 responses LBUSD received as of Wednesday, staff shared that the four most common are: keep Signal Hill together in one area; keep California Heights, Los Cerritos and Bixby Knolls in one area; consider the 405 Freeway a geographic boundary dividing neighborhoods; and generally keep neighborhoods together. 

Grayson said LBUSD will distribute and mail flyers with a QR code to its redistricting webpage in an effort to seek further input.

However, Board President Juan Benitez expressed concern that with less than a month until the board is scheduled to decide on a final map, LBUSD needs to better target affected neighborhoods and other communities of interest. 

“We need boots on the ground,” he said.

Benitez suggested taking laptops to public events and community groups to show the redistricting maps in real-time and solicit public input on the spot. 

“I’m really concerned about the lack of community engagement because […] we don’t have a lot of time,” he said. 

Benitez also said LBUSD needs to provide the public with more context about what drives redistricting maps and their consequences, adding that mailings will only get responses by the most engaged voters rather than marginalized communities. 

“All we really need here is a laptop and a five-minute explanation,” Benitez said. “If we’re going to rely mostly on digital access—and we know that digital access presents a lot of challenges and barriers for our communities of interest—then we’ve got three weeks to figure out how else to do targeted engagement.”