by JENNIFER BIUNDO
As Texas lawmakers carve up the state into newly drawn districts for the House, Senate and U.S. Congress, Hays County leaders are preparing for their own redistricting battles.
Following explosive growth in the Buda-Kyle area since the 2000 Census, Hays County’s Commissioner Precinct 2 has swelled to more than 52,000 residents, well over the target of about 38,000. Though one of four political jurisdictions, Precinct 2 now represents fully one-third of the county’s population.
“Precinct 2 is going to have to lose anywhere from 12,000 to 14,000 people,” said Republican Mark Jones, who was elected to represent the Precinct 2 seat in November.
But just where those constituents will go remains up for debate. A bipartisan redistricting committee is preparing to make recommendations to Hays County commissioners next month for a precinct map; the GOP-led commissioners court will make a final decision.
That worries some local Democratic leaders. In the last half decade, the Hays County Commissioners Court swung from a 4-1 Republican majority to a 4-1 Democrat majority in 2006, and back just as abruptly to a 4-1 GOP bloc in 2010.
“The reality about redistricting and how that process works is whoever is in charge makes the decisions,” said Buda Councilmember Sandra Tenorio, a Democrat who is serving on the redistricting committee. “They will make it to their best advantage.
The reality is things are decided based on which precincts will be Republican and which will be Democrat.”
Many of the Precinct 2 residents in Buda or Kyle will likely be added to Precincts 3 or 4, which represent Wimberley and Dripping Springs, respectively. Currently Precinct 3 is short by about 5,300 constituents and Precinct 4 is down by nearly 7,300.
Alternately, some local Democrats have proposed a map that would combine Wimberley and Dripping Springs into a single precinct, giving extra representation to the Buda area.
“If you look strictly at population it doesn’t make a lot of sense for Wimberley and Dripping Springs to each have a commissioner, but I just think it’s too big of a change at this time,” Jones said.
Meanwhile, current proposals would instead pull residents from Kyle and Buda’s western edges – where the population tends to be whiter and wealthier – and add them to Precincts 3 and 4.
The city of Kyle already is fractured between precincts 1 and 2, with the heavily minority voting precinct 127 lying in Pct. 1. By far the largest voting box in the county, more than half of the 12,000 residents of Pct. 127 are Hispanic.
“It could be that Kyle ends up in three precincts, so I hope the people of Kyle pay attention,” Tenorio said. “There’s got to be some mid-ground between lumping Wimberley and Dripping Springs together, and bringing Dripping all the way down to I-35 around Kyle.”
Pct. 1 Commissioner Debbie Gonzales Ingalsbe, who is serving on the redistricting committee, said the process would follow state and federal laws intended to protect minority voting rights.
“As best we can, we want to maintain communities,” Ingalsbe said. “We don’t want to split those up.”
CLARIFICATION
The story, “Pct. 2 one step closer to new digs,” in the May 18 edition was unclear about the process by which the design-build firm was chosen. The Pct. 2 Steering Committee selected four companies from a field of 13 that expressed interest.
