SF Redistricting Task Force Rejects Final Draft Map, Missing Deadline and Risking Legal Challenge

Thousands of public comments. Hours of heated testimony. Accusations of political interference. Sexually tinged insults exchanged by redistricting officials.

The drawn-out decennial effort to redraw the map determining district boundaries in San Francisco, and who gets to vote for which seat on the Board of Supervisors, has certainly not lacked for drama.

Of course, it isn’t simply acrimony for acrimony’s sake. The changes enshrined by this task force will take away, or solidify, voting power for communities across the city for the next decade.

But after a nearly 10-hour meeting, including public comment from some 150 concerned residents, the San Francisco Redistricting Task Force late Wednesday night narrowly rejected what was supposed to be its final version of the map, amid lingering equity issues and accusations that it unfairly advantaged the city’s Democratic moderates, to the detriment of progressives.

“This final draft map diminishes the ability of communities of interest, made up of some of our most vulnerable populations, that should be included in a single district for purposes of their fair and effective representation,” task force member Chema Hernández Gil said during the hybrid in-person/virtual meeting.

The 5-4 vote to scrap the draft means the commission will fail to meet the city’s binding Thursday deadline to submit a final version, and could now face legal action.

Some dissenters also argued that if the draft map had been approved Wednesday, the task force would face a legal challenge anyway on allegations of voter disenfranchisement.

Notably, the five members who voted down the map were appointed by the Board of Supervisors and the Elections Commission, with one swing vote from the body’s chair, Rev. Arnold Townsend, who was appointed by Mayor London Breed and has been accused of being swayed by her. Two of the four yes votes came from members appointed by Breed, who have faced similar accusations.

While on paper the task force has the seemingly apolitical job of redrawing voter lines that reflect population changes detailed in the 2020 census, the impact of those decisions has an outsize effect on the balance of political power in San Francisco.

The Chinese communities in Chinatown and the city’s southeast, the Filipino community in South of Market, the Black community in the Bayview, the transgender community in the Tenderloin, the gay community in the Castro, the Latino community in the Mission and Excelsior — all of these groups and more are pushing the redistricting task force to keep them grouped to preserve the collective power of their vote and allow them to effectively advocate for their needs.

The most recent draft of the map, those groups argue, would have splintered their communities, weakening their political influence and representation. For instance, bringing the wealthy Sea Cliff neighborhood into the Richmond’s voting lines could make that district more conservative and potentially diminish the influence of Asian voices, while moving a slice of Potrero Hill out of District 10 would split up Black communities.