Alameda County Board of Supervisors Approves Redistricting Map

Alameda County has nearly completed the thorny task of redrawing its supervisorial districts based on the 2010 U.S. Census. 

The County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a new district map at its meeting on Tuesday.

The new boundaries keep the City of Pleasanton intact — including the newly annexed Staples Ranch and unincorporated Happy Valley — but move it into the district represented by Supervisor Nate Miley (District 4) from the one represented by Scott Haggerty (District 1).

Dublin, previously split between Districts 1 and 4, moves entirely into District 1 in the final map. 

The shift represents the only major change in district boundaries from the current map.

San Leandro remains in District 3, along with San Lorenzo, Alameda and parts of Oakland.

District 1 includes Livermore, Fremont, Sunol and Dublin.

District 2 includes Hayward, Union City and Newark.

District 4 includes Pleasanton, Castro Valley, Ashland, Cherryland, Fairview, and parts of Oakland.

District 5 includes Albany, Berkeley, Emeryville, Piedmont and parts of Oakland.

Miley, who serves as board president, congratulated the board for getting through the redistricting process “in a collegial manner.”

“I think it’s been a good exercise,” Miley said, adding that he was content to represent Pleasanton going forward.

“I know Supervisor Haggerty will introduce me to the Pleasanton community,” Miley said.

The supervisors’ adoption of the new map, Map E_1, all but ends a month-long process in which citizens and local government representatives lobbied for competing proposals. The Board of Supervisors must take a second vote on the map on July 26 before it becomes final, but board members indicated they weren’t likely to change their minds before then. 

A significant shift in boundaries in the southern part of the county was necessary because the population there has exploded in the past decade. District 1 now has nearly 30,000 more people than it ought to.

Meanwhile, the comparatively petite Districts 3 and 4 are more than 5 percent undersized.

A Tri-Valley group called the Alameda County Citizens Redistricting Task Force, which is closely affiliated with the Tea Party Patriots, would have split Hayward into two separate districts to remedy the imbalance, keeping the Tri-Valley (including Pleasanton, Livermore, and Dublin) in a single district. The Tri-Valley area also includes San Ramon and Danville, but those communities are in Contra Costa County.

Nevertheless, dissenting voices were absent from Tuesday’s meeting.

Only one man, Hayward resident Jesus Armas, spoke at the meeting, thanking the supervisors for keeping Hayward intact in the new map. (Armas is also on the Hayward school board, but said he was speaking as a member of the public.)

Still, county staff and Supervisor Haggerty said they had received a number of last-minute pleas from Pleasanton residents and politicians to keep the city in District 1. Haggerty expressed frustration with what he said were mixed messages from the city.

“I’m a little confused with the City of Pleasanton right now, I must say,” Haggerty said at the meeting, noting that the board had made an effort to keep Pleasanton whole in the new map per requests from city leaders and residents. 

“I think we’ve responded to the preponderance of constituents…who were adamant they didn’t want the city of Pleasanton split,” Haggerty said.

The supervisor added that he would continue to look out for Pleasanton’s interests, even though he wouldn’t be officially representing the city.

Still, some Pleasanton officials said they weren’t happy.

"(Haggerty) knows all the right people, he knows what our issues are and I'd hate us to get separated from that," said Pleasanton Councilman Jerry Thorne.

Thorne said the Pleasanton City Council and others were open to meeting with Miley. But he said he worried about Miley's large district and potential competing interests from his other constituents.

"It's not a matter of conflict,” Thorne said, “it's just where you put your time and effort."

Thorne said he thought the Tri-Valley should remain politically unified.

"Splitting apart the Tri-Valley is not the right thing to do right now," he added. "That distributes us too thinly and it's confusing to the people who live here."

At the meeting, Haggerty predicted that in 2020, when the next U.S. Census will spur a subsequent redistricting process, the Tri-Valley would have a big enough population to warrant its own district.

“That continues to be a goal of mine,” Haggerty said. “We just couldn’t get there this time with the population."