The Greensboro City Council assigned a member to run its redistricting process, and he said publicly there seemed to be no need for action...
...and then another member advanced a plan that redraws district lines to her advantage, with said plan released late on a Friday afternoon and voted into reality two business days later, with the guy in charge of the process absent.
Another member was absent as well, so the hasty decision to redistrict thousands of voters was made by less than a majority of the total Council.
Whatever the merits of the plan, the process stinks.
As Joe Killian explains it, the issue can be revisited if one of the members who voted in favor of the plan asks to do so.
The four are Bill Knight, Trudy Wade, Mary Rakestraw, and Nancy Vaughan.
At least one of them should step up and do the right thing.
Mary says of the redistricting plan in this morning's paper that she has "no idea where it came from", it just "mysteriously showed up on her doorstep".
This whole thing is beyond the pale. I've been around enough to understand much of how things get done at City Hall, but anyone who supports this action - or at the least doesn't make every effort to get it reconsidered by the full Council - should reconsider running for their seat again unless they enjoy losing.
Even I feel "disenfranchised" by this move, and I wasn't re-redistricted. Surely I'm not alone in feeling that way.
Nancy. I know you read Ed's blog as religiously as I. Move to re-consider.
Posted by: David Hoggard | Apr 21, 2011 at 06:32 AM
I am not there.........yet, said Nancy Vaughan in the News and Record about reconsidering the motion.
Posted by: David Craft | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:05 AM
why is this? Why is she so interested in help Mary Rakestraw? How can she look herself in the mirror after what she has done? What she has done is very unethical and she knows it.
Posted by: Ron | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:07 AM
Second that. This thing stinks on ice. Someone needs to call for a do-over (or an un-do).
Posted by: Thomas | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:11 AM
The map says it all look at the spring garden area that is about as bad as your favorite rep brad miller uses a sliver to get the voters from guilford county and the admission in today's paper as what David says is more evidence that this was a sham from the beginning . Let's see if zack will speak out, and hopefully Nancy will consider.
Posted by: Triadwatch | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:18 AM
Worse, per the N&R article, Nancy essentially blames Zack for not telling the council there was opposition to redistricting. Did she not see the full room in front of her?
Posted by: glenwoodobserver | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:48 AM
To be fair, she did not say that she would have changed her mind about the redistricting had she known, she just say that Zack was appointed to be the point man on this and that he didn't make a recommendation and didn't communicate to them that there was as much opposition as she saw there.
That said, she said it's not unusual for there to be a lot of opposition on a controversial issue and that doesn't always mean you should change your vote.
Posted by: Joe Killian | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:56 AM
Zack, man up and take some responsibility. Nancy, you need to do the wrong thing and bring this up for ALL of council to vote on this. Its unfair to the rest of council and its unfair to the citizens of Greensboro. Right now the citizens of Greensboro are pissed and it looks like we may see a lot of new faces on city council after November.
Posted by: Ron | Apr 21, 2011 at 08:57 AM
The thing is nobody is explaining why they voted the way they did and thats a slap in the face to the citizens of Greensboro. Nancy said she didn't say anything because of the environment in council chambers. Nancy why didn't you explain yourself to the media afterwards. Nobody is explaining why they voted to support this plan because they know they were wrong. There is no way to explain it. It was political maneuvering to help Mary Rakestraw.
Posted by: Ron | Apr 21, 2011 at 09:03 AM
Joe - Your explanation of Nancy's words and actions doesn't remove the idiocy of her rationale.
Posted by: glenwoodobserver | Apr 21, 2011 at 09:18 AM
That's somebody else's job. I was just giving a little context.
Posted by: Joe Killian | Apr 21, 2011 at 09:39 AM
Oh right, I'm gonna turn out at a redistricting meeting to oppose a move I never saw coming. Shame on us for not being clairvoyant.
Posted by: Fec | Apr 21, 2011 at 09:43 AM
Distracting. Nobody is watching the budget.
Posted by: Don Moore | Apr 21, 2011 at 11:04 AM
Somebody's watching, Don. Two stories in the two days since the manager's proposed budget was made public.
On top of -- not instead of -- the three redistricting stories we've had.
http://www.news-record.com/content/2011/04/19/article/greensboro_manager_outlining_15_million_in_budget_cut_options
http://www.news-record.com/content/2011/04/20/article/city_cuts_could_leave_pools_high_and_dry
Posted by: Joe Killian | Apr 21, 2011 at 11:14 AM
I am in Chicago and ran into a councilman today. When he heard I was from Greensboro, he said we could teach folks in Chicago a thing or two about how to get politics done.
Posted by: Patrick Eakes | Apr 21, 2011 at 07:27 PM