One of the selected plans was submitted by the Berkeley Student District Campaign, a group that aims to give students more representation in city government through the creation of a district with a student supermajority. A student supermajority would increase the likelihood of a UC Berkeley student being elected to Berkeley City Council.

“It’s important to note how historic of a move the council took last night (by) indicating that one of their top proposals is one submitted by students,” said Shahryar Abbasi, ASUC external affairs vice president. “It’s quite a shift in the discourse and the dialogue.”

About 45 UC Berkeley students, including Abbasi, attended the City Council meeting in support of the campaign. While seven different plans were considered at the public hearing Tuesday night, only two did not include a student-majority district.

The only remaining competition to the Berkeley Student District Campaign is the “simplicity” plan, which focuses on straightforward district divisions. The plan’s author, Eric Panzer, openly endorsed the Berkeley Student District Campaign’s plan and said that he hopes his proposal will be considered only as a “worthy alternative.”

The City Council may favor Panzer’s plan due to its clarity, according to ASUC External Affairs Vice President Redistricting Director Noah Efron.

“There are certainly some council members who want clean lines on their map,” Efron said. “The council still has full control.”

Throughout the hearing, multiple City Council members expressed their support for a student-majority district, which has never existed in the city of Berkeley. The only UC Berkeley student to ever hold a seat on the City Council was current State Assemblymember Nancy Skinner, who served from 1984 to 1992.

The plans were made possible by the passage of Measure R last November, which amended the existing city charter to eliminate the 1986 boundary lines and adjusted the district boundaries to reflect the city’s updated population.

According to ASUC External Affairs Vice President-elect Safeena Mecklai, a student district would allow students a say in major city issues like safety, economic development and other issues that impact students and residents equally.
“I think we would benefit from more voices of young people,” said Councilmember Jesse Arreguin last night. “It accomplishes the goal but keeps a lot of major neighborhoods intact.”

The next public hearing, during which the City Council is slated to select a plan, will be on July 2.

Though the meeting will take place during the summer, Mecklai said the campaign plans to build a coalition of students to attend and express their support.

“We certainly took (last night) as a great victory, and it certainly feels more tangible now than it ever has,” Efron said. “(But) until we hear that they have officially adopted it, we won’t be celebrating.”

Contact Claire Chiara at cchiara@dailycal.org.

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Six groups presented the council with seven different plans for redistricting, one of which was made by the Berkeley Student District Campaign in an attempt to create a student supermajority district. UC Berkeley junior and current redistricting director Noah Efron, senior Michael Manset and junior and ASUC External Affairs Vice President-elect Safeena Mecklai all presented for the BSDC.

Representatives of the BSDC said in the meeting that because the student community is currently divided into four districts, it is difficult for students to have their voices heard on the council. A student supermajority district would allow students to be represented on City Council.

“Twenty-five percent of Berkeley residents are students and they are not represented,”  Manset said during his presentation. “By creating a student district, students will have an institutionalized seat on the council to represent them. Our plan has District 7 remain the student district but increase in size so that 86 percent of students live in the district.”

Mecklai said that if having a student council member is not possible, the council member elected should understand student issues and be in tune with issues in student life.

“If the student community is condensed to one district, students will have more of a voice on the council,” Efron said. “The student community should be seen as a community of interest because while crime has decreased in other districts, in the student community crime has remained the same.

UC Berkeley alumnus Alfred Twu also submitted a redistricting plan and said that a student district should be made so that students could have a voice on the council.  However, Sherry Smith, president of the League of Women Voters of Berkeley, Albany and Emeryville, said that other communities and neighborhoods should also be considered when redistricting rather than just the student community.

“I can see why students would want a student district because then they would have an impact on the council and the council member elected by them would be responsive to their needs,” Smith said. “However, there are other communities of interest, such as the West Berkeley neighborhood, that should be considered. So what the council must do is weigh all the submitted plans out and possibly merge some together to achieve what is best for the city of Berkeley.”

Berkeley City Council will meet again on May 7 to vote on a redistricting plan and will begin to modify and change the plan once it is chosen.

Contact Seif Abdelghaffar at sabdelghaffar@dailycal.org.

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Right now, we have a unique opportunity to draw the nation’s first ever “student district” through the city’s redistricting process. Of the seven proposals submitted by residents, five of them include a student district. As the Council considers which map to adopt for the next decade, both students and the citywide community should consider the benefits of having a student on the City Council.

A student district will institutionalize the dialogue between the campus and the citywide community. Currently, city-student relations rely on informal communication between student organizations and individual Council members.

Council members do their best to communicate with students, but we deserve someone who is actively and continuously advocating for our issues. The only way that we’re going to create more affordable student housing, bring stores and restaurants that students want to Berkeley and reduce crime near campus is by electing a representative who knows what it’s like to be affected by our issues. A student district, with a current or recent student on the council, will ensure that students have this kind of representation and a voice in city debates. Councilmember Laurie Capitelli was recently quoted in a Daily Cal column stating that “there has not been a venue for students to articulate their concerns.” A student district would ensure that City Hall would be such a venue.

This institutionalization of city-student dialogue will not only benefit students; it’s good for everyone in Berkeley. Mayor Tom Bates often cites the city’s Climate Action Plan goals to help the environment by decreasing our carbon footprint. But students already live in the densest housing and overwhelmingly use public transit to get to class or work! Students already play a major role in helping the city meet our Climate Action Plan goals, and could contribute greatly to increased sustainability in the future if the City taps into their valuable knowledge.

Likewise, the citywide community will also benefit if we reduce our “brain drain” and incentivize more young people (that is, recent Cal graduates) to live in Berkeley after graduation. We should aim to create more projects like the Skydeck, an incubator for startups right in Downtown Berkeley, which provide jobs and an innovation pipeline for Berkeley grads. By creating high-tech and higher-wage jobs, recent graduates can be the engine of a burgeoning, sustainable Berkeley economy. Keeping students here will attract knowledge-based industry and bring more revenue to the city. But once again, the best way to find out what will keep students here after graduation is to ask them. Even better: have a student on Council who can channel that perspective into economic development and housing policies.

Even with these undeniable benefits of having a student on City Council, there have been concerns that a student Councilmember would be politically isolated. (They would be just 1 vote out of 9). However, this fear is not only unfounded — it implies that having zero votes is better than having one. Policy-making at all levels of government requires deal-making and consensus. A sole Councilmember cannot write laws alone; legislating requires building coalitions. The point of having a student representative is not that it will magically solve all our problems, but it will give students a seat at the table and allow our voices to be heard.

Last fall, Mayor Tom Bates and Councilmembers Arreguin and Wozniak all expressed support for a student district. The mayor himself claimed that “if (Measure R) passes, we will actually create a student district. And I’m committed to that campus district … I’m committed not just to talk about it … Let’s have a student on the council. Let’s have a student there voting for their own interest.”

We need to hold our elected officials accountable to that statement, and we need to lobby them to create the student district that we deserve. Student political participation is at an all-time high: The ASUC registered over 8,500 new students to vote last fall. With higher student turnout following those registration drives in student precincts, Berkeley students were a major reason that Measure R passed overwhelmingly and Measure S failed. Students can be a grassroots political force, and we (the students and the City) should work together to craft policy that moves our city forward.

But we can’t do this without the help of every Cal student! There are two ways you can help convince City Council to create a student district. First, attend the CityCouncil redistricting public hearing on May 7 (more info at BerkeleyStudentDistrict.com/events/). Second, like us on Facebook (Facebook.com/BerkeleyStudentDistrict/) to stay informed. Working together with our neighbors in the city, we can create a student district, make our voices heard and bring new and innovative perspectives to city policy.
Shahryar Abbasi is the ASUC external affairs vice president. Noah Efron and Michael Manset are UC Berkeley students who have worked on the redistricting issue with Abbasi.

Contact the opinion desk at opinion@dailycal.org.

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Authors of the six redistricting plans presented their proposals before a group of about 40 community members and four council members — Linda Maio, Gordon Wozniak, Laurie Capitelli and Jesse Arreguin — as well as city staff representatives, at the special meeting moderated by the League of Women Voters of Berkeley, Albany and Emeryville. This was the first opportunity for the community to view the redistricting plans for Berkeley’s eight City Council districts, which are revised every 10 years to comply with census data and fluctuations in the city’s population.The city charter requires that redistricting proposals must adhere as closely as possible to the 1986 district boundaries and create districts with equal populations of about 14,073 people each and clear boundaries.

The authors of the proposals range from residents trying to preserve neighborhood boundaries to UC Berkeley students hoping to create a student district within the city.

ASUC Vice President of External Affairs Joey Freeman presented the Berkeley Student District Campaign’s proposal but acknowledged that their proposal will never be chosen because it does not comply with the city charter.

“Students have a huge role in making Berkeley what it is,” Freeman said. “Student issues are community issues … this is really a simple matter of fairness and justice.”

The group’s goal is to make a statement with their proposal and to attempt to eventually amend the city charter so that a student district could be possible by putting it on the ballot for the November 2012 election.

Another group of students representing UC Berkeley, Berkeley City College and local high schools also submitted a redistricting proposal. The group, the Maximum Participation Minimum Deviation Coalition, is made up of 10 students who interned with the City Council over the summer.

The coalition’s proposal sticks closely to the 1986 district boundaries with some necessary adjustments for population. The coalition’s proposal deviates from the population goal for each district by at most 35 people, which they said is the smallest margin of deviation of any of the proposals.

“Our main criteria was creating an equal population distribution,” said Berkeley City College student Audrey Gutierrez, who presented the coalition’s proposal at the meeting. “We tried to get as close as possible to the one person/one vote idea.”

Plans for redistricting had to be submitted to the city clerk by Sept. 30. City staff then reviewed the plans. The proposals were then made available on the city website on Nov. 3.

The first public hearing will take place at the City Council’s meeting Tuesday, where the council will be able to review the plans and ask the authors questions. By the second public hearing on Jan. 17, the council will decide which proposal they want city staff to draft into an ordinance.

The ordinance should then be adopted by the council in its first and second readings in February and March.

The final district map must be submitted to the Alameda County Registrar of Voters by April 1 for the November 2012 election.

“Redistricting is a public process in Berkeley,” said Deputy City Clerk Mark Numainville at the beginning of the meeting. This was not always the case, however.

According to Sherry Smith, president of the League of Women Voters of Berkeley, Albany and Emeryville — an organization open to people of all genders over 18 that promotes political responsibility through informed and active participation — this is essentially the first time that members of the community have been encouraged to submit their own plans since the uproar that resulted from the city’s redistricting proposal in 2000.

Redistricting plans at that time were devised by the city. Many people in Berkeley felt that the city’s proposal was unfairly distributed. The League of Women Voters were involved with the referendum to repeal the districts that the city was trying to create, which prompted the city to redraft their plan.

“It’s much better to have lots and lots of options,” Maio said. “We didn’t have this variety of proposals in the past.”

Maio and Smith also agreed that software improvements have made it much easier for people to access census data and apply it to district maps themselves.

Adelyn Baxter covers city government.

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