Henrico supervisors approve revised reapportionment plan

The Henrico Board of Supervisors Thursday night unanimously adopted new boundary lines for the county’s five magisterial districts, approving a slightly revised reapportionment map that addressed some concerns raised earlier this week by several citizens and the Henrico NAACP.

The approved map – devised during a day-long session Tuesday involving county planners and Board Chairman Dan Schmitt of the Brookland District – kept three Fairfield voting precincts (Oakview, Randolph and Mountain) in that district instead of moving them to the Brookland District as the county’s original proposal would have done.

By doing so, it reduced by about 1% – to 5.55% – the collective population deviation among the five districts (the total amount by which the districts' population levels were higher or lower than the “ideal” population count of about 67,000) from the original county proposal. That missive – to bring each district closer to an equal population – was a key part of a map proposal submitted early Tuesday morning by the Henrico NAACP.

As part of the process, supervisors also Thursday unanimously approved an ordinance amendment moving several voting precincts to new districts.

By keeping the three precincts in Fairfield and not moving them to Brookland, supervisors slightly reduced the minority population both there and in Fairfield, Planning Director Joe Emerson told them, and also created a slightly less compact boundary between the two.

But board members were pleased with the end result, which addressed the NAACP’s key concern without implementing its entire proposal. (The full NAACP plan would have caused more voting precincts to shift districts and also would have made Tuckahoe more diverse but Three Chopt less diverse, Emerson said.)

The Fairfield and Varina districts – both majority-minority districts – will remain that way comfortably as part of the new plan.

Fairfield District Supervisor Frank Thornton, who along with Tuckahoe Supervisor Pat O’Bannon has served on the board since 1996, praised fellow board members for being open to hearing – and acting upon – the NAACP’s suggestion.

“I don’t recall that we’ve ever. . . taken a plan from a group such as we did this time and correlated information from that,” Thornton said. “To me, that’s rather important.”

Three Chopt District Supervisor Tommy Branin thanked the NAACP for bring its ideas to the county but joked that its timing could have been a bit better.

“Next time can you get it in a little earlier?” he asked, referencing the 5:30 a.m. email the organization sent to supervisors and county officials Tuesday – the day they had originally planned to adopt a new boundary map.

In an email to county officials Thursday afternoon, NAACP representatives thanked them for hearing their request.

“We are thankful to the county for acknowledging the positive attributes of the Henrico NAACP's Draft Reapportionment Plan,” the organization wrote. “We thank the county for acknowledging the merit of our argument that Brookland should not be taking voters from Fairfield.”

Varina District Supervisor Tyrone Nelson told his colleagues that he wasn’t thrilled that the plan would leave his district about 2.7% below the ideal population count – especially because the district is growing more slowly than are Fairfield, Brookland and Three Chopt.

“I guaranteed you by the time we get to 2031 [the next reapportionment], we’re going to be at this same spot again, pushing the western part of Varina into the eastern part of Fairfield,” Nelson said. “At some point we have to look at how comfortable we are making that move.

“I’m just disappointed that I can’t have the same amount of residents that you guys have.”

Supervisors were required by state law to adopt a new set of boundaries by Dec. 31. By sometime early next month, county officials plan to send the map to the Virginia attorney general's office for preclearance – a review process required for all state localities under the recent Voting Rights Act of Virginia to ensure that districts are equitable. Pending approval, the new boundaries will take effect by sometime in February.