Learn about California's upcoming redistricting; El Dorado County should see big boundary shifts

After the results of the 2020 Census are released, California's political boundaries will change in many areas as a result of population shifts. El Dorado County's five districts will see some change, most likely with District 5 that contains Meyers and South lake Tahoe growing in geographic size due to a large increase in population on the western boundary.

Join the California Citizens Redistricting Commission on Tuesday, April 20 for a Redistricting Basics presentation to learn about redistricting, why it is important, how it affects you and how to participate in the process.

The Commission is creating California's new statewide election districts for its Congressional, State Senate, State Assembly, and State Board of Equalization districts. The process of creating the new districts happens every 10 years after the census. When they create new districts, certain guidelines must be followed. One of the guidelines is to learn about communities across California and to keep communities together in the new districts when possible.

New boundaries are created in conformity with strict, non-partisan rules designed to produce districts of relatively equal population and with the goal of providing fair representation for all Californians,

Tuesday's presentation with a question and answer period will be livestreamed from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. on the WeDrawTheLinesCA.org website.

El Dorado County has a redistricting team made up of the Chief Administrative Officer, Surveyor, County Counsel and the Registrar of Voters who will work with the Board of Supervisors and bring results to future public meetings. Census results should be to the County in September at the earliest.

Between the last two censuses the County by grew by about 25,000 residents resulting in a redistricting after the 2010 Census, and more of the same is expected when the final numbers are received. That growth was disproportionate across supervisorial districts. That last census resulted in District 5, the one that includes South Lake Tahoe and Meyers, gaining land to make up for the loss of ten percent of its portion of the county population. At the same time, District 2 gained about 46 percent of the population due to growth in communities like Latrobe, Somerset, Pleasant Valley and south of Cameron Park.