Email sent today to Dallas Mayor documenting potential Federal voting rights lawsuit

This is an email delivered to Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson and the City Council on 5/18/22 after my presentation on these same facts.  If  Map 41B is approved by the Council, is there any real alternative other than filing a federal voting rights lawsuit?

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Honorable Mayor Johnson and members of the Dallas City Council,

 

Tomorrow I will spend three minutes presenting critical data about the City Council Redistricting Map 41B that you will be formally receiving at the same meeting.

 

I was very involved in both the 2011 City Council Redistricting and again this year.  Consequently, I was able to understand more of the history of the injustices against Dallas minority communities over the past 31 years of redistricting.

 

Cracking is the breaking up of racial and ethnic groups into different districts so their numbers are small enough that they are never able to elect a representative from their group without significant help and approval from the majority group in that district, usually White voters.   

Cracking has been one of the main methods used in Dallas against minorities ever since Federal Courts ordered 14-single member districts to be established. It has been used to lessen minority power in Dallas. At times it is used to increase tensions between racial and ethnic groups. Such usage continues until now and will continue unless major amendments are made to the redistricting map you will formally begin studying tomorrow.

 

Here is a map of Dallas and the 5 minority communities that have remained cracked and whose voters are unable to elect councilpersons who look like them since 1991.  

Are you willing to end the 31 years of injustice to these 5 cracked minority communities in 2022? Map COD-040, which has been amended into the People’s Map, does that, creating 9 winnable minority districts in the process.  The amendments done to the People’s Map were aimed at incorporating all the improvements made with 41B, improvements that did not hinder minority representation or compactness. The People’s Map has an average perimeter of 42.14 miles, almost a full mile less than the 43.12-mile average perimeter of Map 41B you will study today.  More miles of boundary means that more communities are separated by City Council District boundaries.

 

Here are the maps done by the consultants hired by Dallas, but I modified the coloration in Map 41B to reflect that Districts 1 and 2 were not winnable by Hispanic majorities based on 10 years of election history in District 1. The lower Hispanic VAP and CVAP numbers with the new 41B District 2  made it unwinnable without White support.  The People’s map required no such modifications due to higher Hispanic District 2 VAP numbers and due to the unification of the core of Kessler Park preservationists with District 14 preservationists restoring District 1 to being a winnable Hispanic District.

Here are the Voting Age Population numbers for both maps:

If anyone studies the data and maps above and contrasts them with the 2011 map as well, they quickly see that 41B is the most racially discriminatory map in 20 years for the Dallas City Council! It maintains cracking done in the 1991 map and maintained ever since!

 

We are on the minority side in this battle, a side made up of Black, Hispanic, and White neighbors who all want equitable representation on the Dallas City Council. We want 9 winnable minority districts among the 14 city council districts: 4 Hispanic, 4 Black, and a 9^th strong minority opportunity district that is 79% minority Voting Age Population (VAP).  We support the People’s Map that easily achieves 9 winnable minority districts and does it with the most compact map.

The Redistricting Commission suffered lost time due to poorly directed debates about the Citizen Voting Age Population and the refusal of Dallas to make CVAP data known to the public as they made maps. Thus, a very unrealistic view of Hispanic winnability was allowed.  It obviously could not be used to populate maps, but to judge the winnability of a district it was necessary!  Why was it missing? DISD used it publicly to compare maps.

Here is the CVAP data on both Map 41B and the People’s Map to verify winnability judgments made:

The People’s Map eliminates known cracking and, with additional improvements, creates 9 strongly winnable minority City Council Districts. In doing this we have the most equitable and compact Dallas City Council Map in Dallas History! 

Please amend the People’s Map to Map 41B for the people of Dallas! 

 

Bill Betzen

Comparing Dallas City Council District Map proposals for winnability

Below is a chart of the Dallas City Council Redistricting maps being studied for selection by the Commission and then to use as a platform for any amendments needed. They are the maps that best achieve the Civil Rights goals of maximizing minority participation in our Dallas City Government. These maps produced the most districts that have the highest potential for selecting a minority candidate. It is clearly shown that 9 winnable minority districts are possible. It also shows that 5 winnable Black Districts are possible but not without destroying the potential for a 4th Hispanic District and a 9th winnable minority opportunity district.

In an attempt to measure winnability three different measurements were used: ppb, pph, and ppw. They tell the strength of a minority group in winning a district by telling you how many percentage points exist between the highest VAP (Voting Age Population) percentage racial/ethnic group in a district and the next highest percentage racial/ethnic group. It then identifies that second-place group as either Black, Hispanic or White-Non-Hispanic. This measurement system is used throughout the chart to achieve some objectivity. Since we know CVAP percentages are generally only about 61% of Hispanic VAP percentages but average over 30% higher than Black and White-non-Hispanic VAP percentages, we can make winnability estimations accordingly.

Obviously, this is only a crude measure, but it lends some level of objectivity to a very human process.

To double-check the calculations I have made in this chart it is recommended you randomly select any number in the chart and check it with the identified map
VAP data for the district you want to check. Please let me know immediately if you find any errors. I hope there are none, but it is very possible as this involved multiple calculations.

The numbers 1, 2, 3 & 4 at the top of the four columns for Black Districts and for Hispanic Districts are simply to identify the columns and not to be confused with district numbers. The goal is 4 winnable districts each plus the Minority Opportunity District in the last column as the ninth winnable district.

I value any questions you may have. The chart is below.

Nine Winnable Minority Districts are Mandatory for the 2022-2031 Dallas City Council District Map

Nine winnable minority City Council Districts are Mandatory for the 2022-2031 Dallas District Map. This goal also allows Dallas to have a more compact map with fewer miles invested in district boundary lines separating neighborhoods.  Dallas White-non-Hispanic population has fallen from 47% in 1990 to only 28.1% in 2020.  Why cannot White-non-Hispanic districts be reduced to 5, or 36% of the 14 single-member districts while there are four minimum winnable districts for each the Hispanic community and the Black community with one minority opportunity district between them? 

While 71.9% of Dallas' population is made up of minority groups, with 9 seats redistricted to be winnable by the minority community that is only 64% of the 14 seats. 

Redistricting Map COD-013 being presented 2/28/22 to Redistricting Commission

This is the Dallas City Council Redistricting Map named "COD-013" that I will be presenting at the 3:30 PM 2/28/22 meeting of the Dallas Redistricting Commissioners in the Dallas City Council Chambers in City Hall. Tragically, none of the 12 maps presented to the Dallas Redistricting Commission to date have provided 4 winnable Black districts or 4 winnable Hispanic districts!

Do not hesitate to take the "COD-013" map from the website, improve it, save it as yours, and submit it to the Redistricting Commission. That is how we improve maps! How to do it is all online at https://dallasredistricting.com/

. I welcome questions.

Your questions and comments are valuable.  My email is bbetzen@aol.com. You are also encouraged to speak with the Dallas Redistricting Commission.  They are listed with their email addresses at https://dallasredistricting.com/ where you can also load this COD-013 map and change this map as you like to submit as your own to the Commissioners.  We need more public involvement and more maps.

Bill Betzen 2/24/22

Dallas City Council Redistricting 2022 - opportunity for progress!

 I have been very involved for about 2 months in the Dallas City Council Redistricting Progress that is documented at https://dallasredistricting.com/meetings/

So far I have made 17 maps and now have 9 of the 14 City Council Districts in Dallas designed so that they have minority majorities (8) and one district is a strong Minority Opportunity District. Here is the data produced by Map #17:

However, along the way, I have been very frustrated to be one of the very few members of the public who are submitting maps.  To date, my map is the only one to make it through the submission process, but I am working to improve it. Part of that work is the map above.

Bill