Fred Allebach, Connecting the Dots: SVUSD Trustee Area demographics study

Fred Allebach

member Sonoma Valley Housing Group

member SoCo/ Santa Rosa NAACP

1/2/24

2020 Census SVUSD (Sonoma Valley Unified School District) Trustee Area Compliance Review notes

-see acronym list at bottom

-thanks to Trustee Troy Knox for responding and providing the Davis Demographics materials

Initial questions

How will demographic lessons and context learned here inform the LAFCO DUC (disadvantaged unincorporated communities) study in Sonoma Valley (SV), as well as City and County General Plans existing conditions maps and data charts?

Will a finer-grained Block and Block Group (BG) level analysis as has been done here for SVUSD by Davis Demographics/ Scott Torlucci better and more accurately serve General Plans, LAFCO, and the coming SVUSD reorganization processes?

Are these finer grain studies accurate, what is the underlying Census margin of error? Do professional demographers somehow mitigate Census high margins of error with mathematical sleight of hand i.e., manipulate statistics?

How do CA Voting Rights Act (CVRA) principles of not disenfranchising protected classes cross over to the way LAFCO and other state/ county entities like Housing Elements define disadvantaged communities (DACs) and disadvantaged unincorporated communities (DUCs)?

Are DACs and DUCs protected classes as well as COIs or communities of interest?*

SVUSD Trustee Area redistricting history and current process

In 2019 SVUSD initiated a CA Voting Rights Act (CVRA) process to switch from less-fair district-wide elections to more representative, discreet Trustee Area elections. Five Trustee Areas were established in the SVUSD service area which roughly parallels what I call the lower Sonoma Valley, SV south of Kenwood. This initial CRVA-driven process apparently never allowed for communities of interest (COIs) to be considered*, only protected classes.

In a separate but related process after the 2020 Census, SVUSD had to readjust the Trustee Areas to conform to new 2020 Census data. The second process was a CA Education Code 5019.5 driven process with simpler criteria than the CRVA process, only considering population number, proportional population, and protected classes.

Davis Demographics sources

US Census; Statewide Database, University of California, Berkeley Law, Center for Research; Sonoma COE; SVUSD; Davis Demographics.

The Statewide Database site says: “We are able to fill small requests and take on special projects that relate to redistricting and districts, as well as to the demographic and political make-up of the State of California. In this capacity, we have, for example, created maps of their districts for legislators, and statewide maps for the Justice Department. We have provided journalists with data and maps for articles, and helped students with data analysis. Non-profit organizations have utilized the database in creating demographic maps with densities of particular populations in order to identify locations for new service providers.”

The US Census is the primary source of data. It seems like those looking for social justice type data like myself can find it. But not being a professional demographer, myself and the rest of the public are captive to whatever agency studies there are, that may not be concerned with social justice issues, nor care to look.

2020 SVUSD Trustee Area boundary adjustment methodology

Outer SVUSD boundaries were based on Census Block geography and not on SVUSD geography. 2020 Census data was applied to the 2019 Trustee Area boundaries which had @ 7,500 people per Area with a maximum population variance between Areas of 10%. The goal was to draw new boundaries with 2020 Census updated population and racial data.

Populations were broken down by race and voting age by race. Total population was looked at, not necessarily registered voters or citizens. Population by Trustee Area needs to be nearly the same or proportionally the same. Protected class voters can’t be disenfranchised, the vote of members of a protected class can't be diluted. Protected class in this case is non-white voters, or Latinos. A majority population in an Area district cannot be disenfranchised without violating the CVRA.

Blocks and Census units of measurement

The Trustee Area boundary readjustment process hinges on Census Blocks which are the smallest geography for which you can get basic demographic data for total population by age, sex, race. Census Block Groups (BG) are an aggregation of Blocks. Census Tracts and Places are an aggregation of BGs and Blocks.

The Census has an inventory of collection blocks from which they survey to get a representative sample of an area, not sure how they random sample... Any data the Census is after can be collected with Block level surveys, “Blocks are the basis for all tabulated data from a decennial census”

Blocks can’t be used with American Community Survey (ACS) because the ACS only goes to a BG level. (I have not seen a way to get Block data directly from the Census, still learning here.) However, the SoCo BOS Redistricting process used a tool called DistrictR with which the public could and still can experiment with creating district map scenarios at the Block level. DistrictR has many layers and options, allowing the user to get super fine grained. An hour or so of fooling with the options will show how Blocks can generate custom population data.

One issue then becomes if smaller geographies have a higher margin of error**, how can custom districts be accurate and conform to the CVRA and not disenfranchise protected classes? Is this a matter of time and money or of margin of error only? Is voting the only way people get disenfranchised and become disadvantaged?

What the Trustee Area and BOS redistricting processes showed is that demographics can get more fine-grained than BGs and this fine-grained approach can in effect create custom BGs, custom districts, which is what the Trustee Areas are. In other processes, like LAFCO special district formation, annexation, General Plans and Housing Elements, where COIs are being looked for, there are methods and laws that call to go across BGs to see where COIs exist on the ground at the Block level.

Take home point: Small-area geographic studies can be done.

Geographic equivalency, geographic comparabilty

Since professional (and amateur) demographers all use the same Census data, a geographic equivalency applies, which means that Census products, the SVUSD Trustee Area boundary adjustment study, the BOS Redistricting material, General Plan demographic analysis, and the coming Plan West DUC study can be compared and be considered geographically equivalent (across space) and geographically comparable (across time).

Since all studies are not made for the same purposes, care should be taken to examine how statistics may be biased by agency framing, by the type of questions asked or not asked, by the units of measurement used, by scale of presentation. Nevertheless, stats like population, race, registered voters, median household income, number of households etc. should cross over more or less cleanly if you stay aware of not comparing apples and oranges.

Davis Demographics Trustee Areas 2020 Census @ 7,500 people per Area

Area 1 is north Valley/ Glen Ellen. 27.2% Latino; 64.6% white

Area 2 is Fetter’s/ Boyes/ Springs East. 51% Latino; 41.9% white

Area 3 is Boyes/ El Verano. 36% Latino; 56.7% white

Area 4 is Sonoma west side/ southwest side. 17.9% Latino; 74.1% white

Area 5 is Sonoma east side, northeast side, southeast side. 15.8% Latino; 76.7% white

Davis Demographics Trustee Areas 2020 Census voting age citizens

Area 1 9.4% Latino, 83.1% white

Area 2 23% Latino, 70.8% white

Area 3 20.8% Latino, 73.7% white

Area 4 9.7% Latino, 87% white

Area 5 13% Latino, 79.9% white

Davis Demographics Trustee Area findings from 2020 Census

Areas with the largest number of protected classes are Areas 2 and 3. This shows the same geographic equivalency as my SV Census BG studies published on my Blogspot page.

Areas with the biggest variance from 2019 to 2020 were Areas 1 and 2.

Area 1, wealthier and primarily white had lost 16% of its population, 1,203 people perhaps due to gentrification and higher cost burdening, but had gained Latino residents. Cost burdening for lower income Latinos in this Area would be extreme.

Area 2 had gained 11.9%, 891 people, many of these subject to Springs-area housing overcrowding.

Areas 3 and 4 held about even, losing 41 and 21 people respectively.

Area 5, the Valley’s east side, gained 5% of population, 375 people however this gain, while mostly white and wealthy, does not seem to be primarily families with school age kids.

I think Davis Demographics said that Area 1 tripled its percent Latino population and Area 2 doubled it; is that correct?

Area 2 has a Latino majority and according to the CVRA, this majority should not be diluted, to choose the candidate of their choice. Area 2 also has a denser population than others in the Valley.

Davis Demographics Area Scenarios A, B, and C

Davis made three scenarios relative to the 2020 Census, the first scenario was with the least changes and the most compact. The other two added other criteria to make these options different; this criteria seemed to be a gray area from the Davis Demographics informational item on the Trustee meeting video starting at 2:31. On what criteria would the differences be based? The counsel said that COIs* could not be taken into account, but then seemed to say that with alternate scenarios, maybe they could…

The counsel said that it is a protected class criteria to maintain an existent majority population, and she said, it’s not necessarily a majority but that the district reflects the percent the protected class has in the Area.

This is an example of how cross-BG DUCs can be loc ated and counted on a percentage basis in the BGs they live in.

The Trustees choose Scenario A in 1/22, fir updated Trustee Area boundaries.

Systemic disenfranchisement of a Sonoma Valley Latino protected class

In lower SV there are two different municipalities, the City of Sonoma and the unincorporated Sonoma County. A hodgepodge of County Special Districts serves the unincorporated area. Several districts cross both City and County lines: school, hospital, law enforcement, fire, sewer, water, and groundwater

From a demographic standpoint it is easy enough to see that the City, with less than one third of the people, has sequestered way more resource opportunity candy than the other two thirds. The City is also much whiter, making this segregation possibly into a CVRA protected class issue, since the main district difference between SV City and County is one of agency and political power, of disparity in voter representation, and of being able to set their own respective planning, zoning and land use parameters. The City has five representatives and a full local government for 11,000 people, the rest of the lower valley has one representative for @25,000 people, and thanks to that representative, Susan Gorin, a newly created County service hub in the lower valley.

As well, there is local history of segregation and the City has largely externalized its BIPOC, protected class population “across the tracks” to the Springs and out of valley. The externalized BIPOC population in the Springs area is routinely outmaneuvered and out hustled by much more politically active and influential white COIs who are registered to vote at a much higher percentage. This means that for politicians to be elected locally, they have to cater to increasing white interests or lose, and that they don’t have to worry about a Latino vote because it is so small. This is what systemic disenfranchisement looks like here in SV. This is cumulative effect of a disparate, disadvantaged playing field for local Latino immigrants.

Sonoma Valley depends on low-income, Latino undocumented immigrant labor to be essential workers in the wine-tourism-hospitality combine economy. These people are like modern indentured servants, lacking rights and proportional representation. In the case of SVUSD, Latino students now make up over 60% of the SVUSD student population yet they are only majority in one Trustee Area and the proportion of SVUSD voting age Latino citizens to Latino undocumented residents is very low.

The attached BOS Redistricting process, 2021,1st District Maptitude data sheet shows that 1^st District and SVUSD Latinos are way under-registered to vote relative to their population numbers. SV Latinos get the short end of the stick in multiple ways that have to do with government services, the structure of municipalities and special districts and local government. They are structurally disadvantaged by what I call the Sleepy Hollow Stasis. This is a fractal of segregated white American suburbia.

Something is not right here, to keep in-house indentured servants, keep them poor with low wages, and then not afford them proper representation or ability to plan their own future proportional to their numbers. This is modern feudalism right here in sunny, great Sonoma Valley. No bueno.

One cure: Here is where a San Francisco law sets a precedent SVUSD could follow, to allow undocumented residents to vote in school system elections. This could be taken up by Trustees and staff. The lower numbers of voting age population in Areas 2 and 3 show this disparity. Governor Newsom and the State of CA also set precedents, to offer health insurance, driver's licenses, and other citizen benefits to essential worker, undocumented immigrants.

Rather than put the undocumented on a bus to NYC, CA is taking the total opposite approach. I recommend that SVUSD take up the same approach and begin a process to allow undocumented family adults to vote in SVUSD elections.

Another cure: The City annexes the rest of the unincorporated SV urban service area so as to make the most efficient and just municipality possible, rather than have one third hoard all the resources at the expense of the others. If we shrink from imagining the vagaries of feudal life, why would we accept that here in our own backyard now in 2024?

Sonoma Valley district studies context

For SV-level demographic studies, for example City General Plan existing conditions maps, there seems to be no fundamental limit on using Tracts or Places only. Blocks, BGs, and DistrictR-type tools can be used, rather than erase valid on the ground valid geographies by insisting on only a Tract-level view.

A demographer and/or planning consultant can create custom BGs, districts, or Areas for protected classes and COIs and this would be a reasonable expectation for the Plan West demographic consultant doing the SoCo DUC study, and of City and County General Plan maps and data sheets.

In the BOS Redistricting process, the wealthy, white Bennett Valley cohort was identified as a COI and was unified in the 1st District so as to not spit a COI. COIs* can be a reason for further Balkanization or for unification, depending on who has the political will to direct the districting show.

Davis Demographics public access to Trustee Area web-based map

On the 11/16/21 Davis Demographics presentation to the SVUSD Trustees and staff, a link was provided to a “web-based map for public information.” Fyi, this is not publicly accessible because it is Esri and the public needs an ARCGIS membership to view the map. Not fair to put a paywall in the public’s information that the public already paid for.

It is curious that businesses can buy software to create marketing districts when profit is at stake but social justice advocates have to fight the powers that be to get social justice data on their maps.

Questions for Trustees and SVUSD staff

What were the principal differences between scenarios A, B and C? Why A over B and C? What was the Trustee vote to approve Scenario A, unanimous?

*Cracking and packing districts, protected classes, and COIs

It seems that looking to cover the interests of COIs potentially qualifies as a cracking and packing exercise in district creation. Why? Because with COIs special interests are what is specifically at stake. For example, in SV, the Sonoma Mountain Preservation/ Glen Ellen anti-high density/ market rate housing at SDC cohort is a COI; the Donald St. neighbor anti-inclusion in the Springs Specific Plan cohort is a COI; Sonoma Valley Collaborative is a COI that supports balanced triple bottom line sustainability policy outcomes and more affordable housing. In SV, COIs that are also protected classes can be demonstrated by Census stats, as in the case of lower income immigrant Latinos, or for COIs that are not protected classes, by petition drives to show how many are against or for whatever.

COIs want influence and to be heard and to win, this runs out on a spectrum of seeking more political power and to dominate other interests.

Cracking and packing is gerrymandering and we see this happening nationwide with efforts to control and/or limit the vote. There are two strategies here: either the powers that be are unafraid of the voters and let them vote as much as possible, or they are afraid of the voters and try to distort elections so as to win.

For SVUSD, I suggest to let the undocumented Latinos vote because this is protected class issue and not a COI issue.

Since LAFCO creates special districts, it’s easy to see the gray area where special interests and COIs cross over. For example, COIs are explicitly referenced in an annexation process.

What if a COI is also a protected class? Then COI prohibitions are out? It would seem yes DACs and DUCs are protected classes in SV for race, color, and national origin, which makes Sonoma Valley Latinos a protected class. This protected class status may add some oomph to DUC/ DAC demographic studies to be more fine-grained. For example, the SoCo Environmental Justice Element only looks at the Tract level, is it not less just to intentionally not see more poor people that are really there?

The BOS Redistricting final decision overrode a map with districts favoring protected classes along Hwy 101 and showed the undue influence of a few older white men, and also showed that unincorporated areas are lower on the districting totem pole and have less oomph than SoCo city’s interests. This was quite the political spectacle!

**Margin of error

Davis Demographics cited the US Census as a primary source.

Davis Demographics, who did the 2020 Trustee Area readjustment, in its presentation did not mention Census margin of error as a factor in accuracy of new Trustee Area boundaries.

They did say that the Trustee Area study was done “using population figures as validated by the Demographics Research Unit of the Dept of Finance.”

I have some questions as to 2020 Census margin of error.

One element of 2020 Census margin of error is that it was done under Covid-19 conditions and was intentionally sabotaged to be less thorough by the Trump administration. 2020 numbers began at a compromised level. I was hired as an enumerator for the 2020 Census but chose not to work becausew of Covid.

A critique of BG-level analysis (made by City General Plan consultant DeNovo Planning Group and Census Reporter.org website staff) is that the sample size is too small to make anything other than broad-bucket, general calls. Permit Sonoma has also said that BG level mapping costs too much and takes too much staff time. Staff time cost is a frequent excuse, and it rests with electeds and their political will to tell staff what to do

This is interesting for margin of error because Blocks would theoretically have the largest margin of error of all; they are much smaller than Block Groups. The fact that aggregate Block-level data was taken as the gospel truth for Trustee Area percents is interesting in light of margin of error/ accuracy concerns of DeNovo and Census Reporter staff.

I’d be interested to see a Davis Demographics statement on Trustee Area data margin of error. What if the margin of error percent is 10% or greater? If Davis can produce fine, low margin of error, granular results like the new Trustee Area numbers, how are they doing that? Why can’t I or DeNovo or Census Reporter or maybe Plan West do that with Blocks and BGs too?

Some of this may have to do with proprietary ESRI software and the pay per play ARCGIS website. These entities have figured out how to customize and then put a paywall on the data. To get more fine grained, perhaps there is a higher cost and thus the best social science becomes a matter of money, and those unwilling to spend end up living with a less accurate calibration of their demographics.

Another aspect of margin of error: by only taking a Tract or Place-level view, many COI membership cohorts (and protected classes) (seniors, mobile home park residents, white working class, immigrant Latinos) get erased. Higher-order Tract generalizations create a false impression of what is really on the ground; fine calibration potential is lost. For example, central Sonoma Tract 1502.04 has a very poor BG2 which meets majority DAC status for MHI but mixing in two much wealthier BGs, 2 and 3, erases that DAC status. By only looking at the Tract, the poor side COI of Tract 1502.04 is diluted and erased. Where is the margin of error in that?

Acronyms

ACS US Census American Community Survey

ADU accessory dwelling unit

SVUSD Sonoma Valley Unified School District

COI community of interest

CDC Sonoma County Community Development Commission

HCD CA Department of Housing and Community Development

HE Housing Element

GP General Plan

BOS Sonoma County Board of Supervisors

LAFCO Sonoma County Local Agency Formation Commission

AFFH Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing