A funny thing happened on the way to redistricting in Harford County.
Harford County Council redistricting is required by the county charter once every ten years to ensure that Council districts are “compact, contiguous, and substantially equal in population”. To that end, the Harford County Council proposed redistricting legislation in mid-October that would re-assign some county residents among the county’s six existing Council districts. The catch is that two of those re-assigned residents, Bob Frisch and Cassandra Beverley, are also elected members of the Harford County Board of Education and, as such, are required by state law to live in the Council district they represent.
The state law, which outlines the rules for school board membership in Harford County, doesn’t specifically address members who might be redistricted out of their seats. But the possibility that School Board Members Frisch and Beverely, currently representing Districts A and B respectively, would be forced to resign when county redistricting takes effect early next year, was enough to send local officials searching for clarification late last week.
Bob Frisch, a high school teacher living in Joppa, was elected to the school board in 2010 in District A but would be shifted into District B under the proposed redistricting plan. Cassandra Beverley, an attorney living in Abingdon, was elected at the same time in District B, and would be moved under the proposal to District F, Havre de Grace. The third elected school board member, Board Vice-President Rick Grambo of District D, North Harford, is unaffected by the redistricting plan.
If the redistricting plan becomes law, and if Frisch and Beverley decide to run for re-election, they will certainly have to do so in their new districts. Oddly, Frisch would have to run for the seat currently held by Beverley.
Of more pressing concern last week was the requirement that school board members step down when they no longer live in the district they represent, as called for in the state legislation establishing school board elections in Harford County:
“A member from a councilmanic district shall be a resident of that district.
A member from a councilmanic district who no longer resides in that district may not continue as a member of the county board.”
State Sen. Barry Glassman, sponsor of Harford’s 2009 school board legislation, told The Dagger that he contacted the Maryland Attorney General’s office after the questions about Frisch and Beverley were brought to his attention by local officials attending a PTA legislative forum last Thursday. Citing a response from Katherine Rowe in the AG’s office, Glassman said that since the Harford school board law is based on councilmanic districts, Maryland case law would not allow sitting school board members to be displaced by redistricting.
That will keep both Frisch and Beverley in their seats for now. But if they seek re-election in 2014, they will be in the unusual position of running as incumbents on the school board and as newcomers to their districts.
Below is the Harford County Council legislation outlining the proposed changes to the six Council districts followed by a map of the proposed districts and a link to an election precinct locator based on home address.
Map of Proposed New Council Districts:
Click here to find your current election precinct.
Click here to view the members of the Harford County Council and the districts they represent.
What is the point in having an elected school board if the person who represents your district lives in North Harford, your children go to Havre de Grace schools and the person who does represent your schools lives in Abingdon?? Might as well go back to an appointed school board – either way my vote doesn’t matter.
As a voter in District A I am very disappointing in the actions of the Council. Mr. Frisch won his election by an overwhelming majority and now the voters of our district (if the Council’s redistricting proposal is allowed to stand) will not have the opportunity to return Mr. Frisch to his seat if WE chose to do so. There was a committee (chosen by the Republicans on the Council) established to come up with recommendations which the Council promptly ignored. What was the point? It looks like the Council created a map to satisfy their own interests at the expense of the voters. It doesn’t look as if the County Council is any different then those in Annapolis. Shame on them! I will remember this and the people responsible in future elections – they will not get my vote!
SHHHHHH…..There are those on here who do not believe that republicans can gerrymander too! We don’t want to upset their dream world!
I agree, but why would the Council (with 5 Republicans) want to move Mr. Frisch out of District A which is primarily a democratic district? Moving him to District B (which will be even more conservative under the Council map) really is not a gain for them and practically guarantees a democrat will win that school board seat at the next election. Moving Mrs. Beverley to District F (while move democratic than District B does not guarantee that she will retain her seat.
School board elections are non-partisan.
Personally I would love to see if that Easternmost part of Purple could be swapped with the Western most chunk of grey!
The Council’s recommendation only took into account how the redistricting would impact their political futures. They were not thinking about school board representation which is what the committee’s recommendation addressed. The amount of shuffling of districts in the committee’s recommendation shows how out of kilter the current districts are as far as school’s are concerned.
Confused you are right on the mark.
It seems as though the council is more concerned with their political futures than making the right decisions for the county as a whole.
Easy solution …. just move. Housing prices are very reasonable and the interest rates are great.
“Preserve thy self over all others” should be the motto of this council.
I rarely comment on the “Dagger” but thought it might be helpful for those who do and are concerned with the Board of Education redistricting situation to have pertinent information.
The public school system just completed a system wide attendance area redistricting for elementary schools and as Harford’s population continues to grow it is reasonable to predict that there will be additional school system redistricting within the next few years, certainly before the next census. Both additional elementary and secondary school classroom space can be anticipated. The potential rebuilding of Youth Benefit ES and William Paca/Old Post Road ES with additional capacity there or at the Campus Hill site could require redistricting. The county recently moved to obtain land to build a seperate middle school for Patterson Mill which would increase the population for high school students at the existing Patterson Mill facility, requiring redistricting. If Aberdeen HS continues to grow under the BRAC conditions we could expect high school students from areas currently going to AHS to be moved to the very under capacity Edgewood HS. All these contingentcies could require public school redistricting. Many many more such scenarios are realistic. The BOE can change public school district boundries at any time and that could affect who the elected BOE representative would be.
The Harford County Council members understood the possibilities and consequences outlined above when considering the present councilmatic redistricting process. We recognized that the council, whom ever the members are, could not control all the moving parts related to elected school board membership. The effort was to move the fewest citizens possible to new voting precincts while satifying state election board expectations and being as fair an equitable as possible. The council plan moves nine precincts (one a map requirement)compared to the 21 precinct changes proposed by the commission plan. Any consideration of BOE election districts was subordinate to compliance to the Harford County Charter, Maryland State election law, Maryland Board of Elections expectations,court case history and previous decisions of the Attorney General’s Office.
Based on previous comments from the County Executive and County Council there will be no more forward funding for building new schools or major renovations to exiting schools in Harford County. Given the current economic situation waiting for approval and financial support from the State is not realistic for the foreseeable future. As such, further redistricting of school boundaries is very unlikely nor necessary.
The commission made several proposals including one map that moved only four precincts which also met the legal requirements referenced. Five precincts and several thousand people less than the council’s submitted plan.
I agree with the previous commentor. I read the commission’s report, and they made clear that their second choice map was the one that only moved 4 precincts. And that one would not have moved either of the board members that are moved under the council’s proposal.
I think that the council would have been wise to go with that one. Since it was the commission’s 2nd choice out of the 30 or so maps they created, I don’t think that there would be the public backlash that there is now.
Personally, my suspicion is that Councilman Guthrie was the driving force behind the council’s proposal, as he fears a challenge for his seat from Frisch, and he wants his buddy Jansen on the school board from District A.
As a follow up to the last two comments I offer the following. Comments from (?) are correct, however, I disagree with the conclusions. Harford County can not expect any forward funding for public schools from county government and we also will receive little capital funding from the state until the economic conditions improve significantly. In my few this is all the more reason to expect more public school redistricting. As the student population increases and capital projects are delayed because of funding issues students in schools that become seriously overcrowded will require the BOE to consider moving students to less crowded schools by redistricting, the only option they will have. I also believe that ten years is a long time and conditions can recover significantly in that time period and capital school construction money from both the state and the county may become available and we will move on necessary capital school projects.
Secondly, the commission did offer a second choice redistricting map. And in fact that map, labeled 3b, was the basis for the plan the council is proposing. Plan 3b moved 4 pricincts as the commission presented it, unforntunatly the commission made a material error in not recognizing that one pricinct had been annexed into a municipality since the last census and they assigned it to a different district. That pricinct had to be moved in order to comply with state election board expectations. Therefore, the Council is only proposing to move four pricints more than the commission recommended in plan 3b. Those decisions were based on the conditions preferred by the commission; adjusting areas of similar interest, and compactness.
No single council member has the ability to influence the choice of redistricting proposals. Any action will require a minimum of four votes and there are seven sponsors to the bill proposed. There are going to be conspiracy theorists, that is what it is.