There is nothing as raw in politics than the redistricting process, especially when it gets to breaking down districts by race or ethnicity. But that's exactly what was exposed Monday night at the County Center in downtown Tampa, as the Hillsborough Board of County Commissioners heard 90 minutes of residents fight for or against one of the 10 different proposed maps drawn to separate the four single district seats in the county.
District Three was created as a minority-majority seat, and until it was created there had never been a black representative on the board.
Now with explosive Latino growth in the county over the past decade, some in the Hispanic community have argued that it's their time to have a representative on the board. But the various maps created until recently didn't satisfy those advocates – not until Commissioner Kevin Beckner unveiled his own map, with input from Latino advocates, late last week -a map that included 36 percent of Latinos in District One.
But by calling it "The People's Map," he alienated those who thought he was unfairly gaming the system, and received no support from the other commissioners, who said they didn't want to break up Brandon. Commissioners voted 6-1 for Map G, which will add the Keystone area to District One, a district that already sprawls from the northwestern part of the county down to Apollo Beach.
This article appears in Jun 16-22, 2011.