Gilroy council narrows redistricting to two draft maps, invites public review

The Gilroy City Council on May 5 moved two draft maps forward in its redistricting process and asked residents to focus comments on those options ahead of the next hearing.

Council members said the goal of the night was to narrow the large set of public submissions so the community could concentrate its feedback. After staff walked the council through five draft maps and several public submissions, councilmembers coalesced around two choices: draft map D (noted in materials with the JHO5 overlay) and a modified version of a public submission the council referred to during the meeting as map F.

The council’s demographer, in a presentation, described the criteria used to draw the drafts: equalizing population by U.S. Census counts, maintaining contiguity, minimizing splits of communities of interest and improving compactness. She noted that total population deviations for the draft maps ranged roughly from about 2 percent to 7.5 percent — well under the generally accepted 10 percent maximum deviation — and flagged Latino CVAP (citizen voting-age population) results as a point of comparison among the plans.

Councilmembers asked for maps that keep the city’s East Side neighborhoods together and for clearer, straighter boundary lines that follow recognizable streets. Several members expressed a preference for versions that created four districts with a majority Latino CVAP rather than three. Councilmember comments emphasized that the public should be able to review only a few maps before the final selection to enable more focused discussion.

After public comment — including a request from a resident that the East Side be kept intact as a coherent community of interest — the council voted to advance the two drafts (map D with the JHO5 overlay and the modified map F) to the next hearing so they can be the focus of public review. The council directed staff to display those two maps prominently on the city’s redistricting website as “the maps being considered.” Councilmembers also said sequencing (which districts are up for election in 2026 vs. 2028) will be discussed at the next meeting and that the community should weigh in on sequencing once the choices are narrowed.

The council reiterated that the city will repeat the process after the 2030 census, saying the current maps are based on the 2020 universe and that populations shift over time.

The council’s formal action was to move the two draft maps forward for public review; the council will take a final vote on a preferred map and sequencing in a future meeting.