These postings on Redistricting will now, 4-30-2011, be moved to a site dedicated to redistricting. The issues of expanding the high school graduation rate should not loose importance or be confused with redistricting. Go to http://dallasredistricting2011.blogspot.com/ to see more postings on Redistricting for Dallas City Council.
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The History of Dallas continues to unfold and provides for our Dallas ISD students a priceless lesson in democracy. Like all cities, Dallas has a history of the unequal distribution of power with minorities and the poor being generally under-represented in positions of power. With the greater transparency being provided to processes such as redistricting, that lack of balance is slowly disappearing. You must make your own judgements as to how far we have yet to go. Here is a demographic spreadsheet on the current Dallas City Council makeup and how it corresponds to the demographic makeup of Dallas as reflected in the most recent census:
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The History of Dallas continues to unfold and provides for our Dallas ISD students a priceless lesson in democracy. Like all cities, Dallas has a history of the unequal distribution of power with minorities and the poor being generally under-represented in positions of power. With the greater transparency being provided to processes such as redistricting, that lack of balance is slowly disappearing. You must make your own judgements as to how far we have yet to go. Here is a demographic spreadsheet on the current Dallas City Council makeup and how it corresponds to the demographic makeup of Dallas as reflected in the most recent census:
Here is a second spreadsheet only counting the Dallas City population for those age 18 and above. 
If you see an error in either of these spreadsheets please do not hesitate to email bbetzen@aol.com. Accuracy is critical. The data from which these spreadsheets are made is from http://www.dfwinfo.com/ris/census/2010/PL.asp?geo=city&area=19000 .
Unless there are errors in the above spreadsheets, the simple conclusion is that the past decades growth in our Hispanic residents in Dallas has led to a significant imbalance on the Dallas City Council makeup. While that imbalance must be corrected in the redistricting process, unnecessary gerrymandering for partisan purposes will only be counterproductive as has been documented at http://www.studentmotivation.org/GerrymanderedDallas/. We must achive balance without risking the breaking up of our communities of interest. See Texans for Redistricting Reform and this video on youtube produced by the Tea Party in support of A. J. Pate and his methods that minimize gerrymandering, voter confusion, and the resulting voter apathy, while also meeting the Voting Rights Act requirements at the same time.
