PD Editorial: The next steps in Santa Rosa’s switch to district elections

Remember counting off to form teams in gym class? One, two, one, two …

Santa Rosa City Council members just finished a political variation of that exercise, carving the city into seven districts for future elections. The first three will be on the November ballot.

A switch from at-large elections probably was inevitable given the growing population and evolving demographics of Sonoma County's largest city. But local voters rejected that change as recently as 2012, and it is happening now to head off a costly lawsuit.

If district elections produce a more diverse council with better representation of west Santa Rosa neighborhoods, the city and its citizens should benefit.

There are, however, likely to be times when parochial considerations are put ahead of broader objectives - or at least they appear to take precedence.

Look no further than the initial set of council districts or, more precisely, which ones voters will fill in 2018 and which ones will wait until 2020.

The council numbered the districts to ensure that the incumbents whose terms expire this year - Mayor Chris Coursey and Councilmen John Sawyer and Tom Schedwelm - can run for re-election without relocating.

Considering the circumstances, we think that was the right call. There is no greater priority in Santa Rosa right now than the recovery from last year's wildfires, and experience and continuity at City Hall can help expedite the process.

Still, the council's decision also means that residents of Roseland and southwest Santa Rosa will have to wait two more years before electing a council member.

And it was the lack of representation from Latino neighborhoods, such as Roseland and southwest Santa Rosa, that left the city vulnerable to a California Voting Rights Act lawsuit and resulted in the switch to district elections.

As Coursey said after voting on the district boundaries, “On the one hand we are creating change with district elections, but on the other hand we're protecting the status quo.”

By law, the council must draw new districts for the 2022 election, using updated population and demographic information from the 2020 census.

This year's process was a little chaotic, initiated by a lawsuit threat and delayed for several months because of the fires. Citizens still showed a keen interest, submitting more than two dozen proposed maps.

Now that the work is complete, there is an opportunity to pause and consider just how district elections should work here.

Santa Rosa joins a growing list of cities in the state switching to district elections. There are now about 60, including 21 that held their first district elections in 2016. About a third of those cities elect a mayor on a citywide basis. In the others, including Santa Rosa, the council picks the mayor. Eight cities have hybrid “from-district” elections, in which candidates run to represent a specific district but are elected citywide.

What do local residents want? They didn't get a say on the shift to district elections. But they could have one now. The city charter needs to be updated to reflect the new election system, and the council seek public input about matters such as mayoral elections, hybrid districts and whether the council, or an independent commission, will draw the boundary lines in the future.

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