Had the board approved the resolution, five community forums would have been hosted at the district's high schools in June to provide additional information and allow the board to receive public input on moving from all at-large positions to some single-member districts. Following more than an hour of discussion and hearing from multiple public commenters who expressed that the move was not right for the district, the board voted 4-3 to table the resolution for an undetermined future date.
Places 1, 4 and 5 Trustees Jun Xiao, Cory Vessa and Amy Weir represented the "no" votes.
As they did during May 18 and 19 meetings, some public commenters expressed during the June meeting that the timing of the request, coming months before the board's November election, was concerning to them. A handful of speakers were open to learning more and moving forward in the process if it was done in an appropriate manner.
"I'm not necessarily for or against SMDs," community member Tracy McKee said. "I just think now's not the time to do it."
The board voted to engage Leon | Alcala PLLC. in its exploration of single-member districts at the May 19 meeting. Under this engagement, firm representative Sara Leon presented information about the process to the board June 2.
Responding to criticism, Trustee Vessa reiterated that her request was tied to timing of the 2020 Census data release. This data was made available to the public in August of 2021 after delays driven by COVID-19 and data integrity concerns, Leon said.
"It really does come from a place of wanting to engage other people in this process and give them an opportunity to have a seat at the table," Vessa said.
The timing of the request was also brought up by other trustees, such as Place 7 Trustee Danielle Weston, who expressed that the shortened time frame was "inappropriate" given the election's proximity. The tentative timeline for adoption of a single-member district plan presented by Leon | Alcala PLLC. showed that the board would need to do so by July 25 to be in place ahead of the November election, when all but Place 2 Trustee Mary Bone, Weston and Xiao's terms expire.
Some trustees stated that they had been interested in exploring the move to single-member districts at some point in the last two years, although the board had voted the measure down at least once before. In 2017, a community petition asking the board to consider single-member districts was brought to the board, but it did not generate any change-making action from the board.
