by BOB BARTON
Once every decade county government has to – ready or not – engage in a redistricting process to establish boundaries for its four area commissioners.
There is plenty of redistricting to be done. Precinct 2, which encompasses the Kyle and Buda areas, swelled to 52,671 people in the last 10 years, far more than either the 33,893 in Precinct 3 (Wimberley area) and the 31,980 in Precinct 4 (Dripping Springs area). Precinct 1, which includes a large chunk of San Marcos and eastern Kyle, is the closest of all of them to the right size with 38,593 residents.
It’s a function that has occurred in Hays since the current constitution was adopted nearly 150 years ago. With the recent completion of the U.S. census which shows that the Hays population has spiraled to 157,107, the Commissioners Court has appointed a four member panel to begin work on the process that will go into effect with next year’s elections.
The Commissioners Court last month appointed two of their own to the committee, Commissioners Will Conley of Wimberley and Debbie Gonzales Ingalsbe of San Marcos, as well as Republican Party chair Bud Wymore of Buda and Democratic Party chair Jon Leonard of San Marcos.
Several county staffers, including Election Administrator Joyce Cowan, will be adding expertise to the process and Attorney Rolando Rios of San Antonio, who advised the court 10 years ago in their redistricting work, will again serve in that capacity.
Back in 2001 there were a series of heated meetings and a half dozen redistricting plans under consideration, with many of the gatherings quite heated. At that time the principal fight occurred between a group headed by then Republican Chairman Ernie Murry of San Marcos, who accused County Judge Jim Powers and commissioners Will Burnett and Russ Molinaar, all three of whom were also Republicans, of refusing to work toward creating a “safe” district for fellow Republican incumbent Susie Carter of the Uhland area.
Murry’s proposal advocated splitting a portion of downtown Kyle, then strongly Democratic, out of the Carter district. The plan eventually failed, aided by strong opposition from former Kyle Mayor James Atkins and a majority of his city council.
Only Ingalsbe remains on the current court and this year’s decisions will probably center on the 1,000 pound gorilla in this year’s data relating to where the county’s citizenry lives.
The current data shows that 64,643 of its residents live in either the Buda or Kyle vicinity, along with another 54,248 in San Marcos and its immediate suburbs. That’s more than 75 percent of the residents of the county living clustered along Interstate 35, but currently only newly elected Commissioner Mark Jones of Kyle and Ingalsbe live in one of the three corridor cities.
Conley, who was elected originally from San Marcos, now lives in the Wimberley area, and newly elected commissioner Ray Whisenant is a Dripping Springs resident. The 10 precincts located in the western part of the county contain only 38,206 of the county’s residents. That amounts to only 24.3 percent of the total county census.
To a lesser extent the same condition existed a decade ago, but any correction got bogged down when the inter-party Republican dispute over the Precinct 2 realignment became so pronounced.
Community leaders from the fast-growing corridor will almost certainly push for a more balanced realignment this time, aimed at correcting the existing statistical imbalance that has grown even larger over the last decade.
No timetable has yet been established, but the redistricting committee is expected to conduct hearings in all of the sections of the county before drawing the final boundary lines in summer or early fall. Next spring’s party primaries will be the first election in the next 10 year cycle to be governed by this year’s realignment.
