North Las Vegas poised to redo voting districts

North Las Vegas looks primed to redraw its voting districts for the first time in a decade.

City Council members on Wednesday heard plans for a proposed redistricting effort that, if approved, would wrap up just months before a pair of City Council seats go up for grabs in November 2015. City leaders did not take any action on the plan, which won’t go up for a council vote until next month.

Ward 4 Councilman Wade Wagner, one of those up for re-election next year, looks set to lose four voting precincts under the redistricting blueprint presented to city leaders on Wednesday.

Ward 2 Councilwoman Pamela Goynes-Brown would pick up eight new precincts under the move.

Wagner, the council’s lone Republican, won his last election by a single vote over incumbent Democrat Richard Cherchio. He stands to pick up four competitive voting precincts ahead of next year’s anticipated rematch with Cherchio.

Goynes-Brown, a registered Democrat, is in line to add an equal number of contested precincts under this week’s proposed ward revisions. She also expects stiff competition in 2015’s nonpartisan municipal races.

Both incumbents admitted the redistricting push was long overdue, though neither seemed to muster much enthusiasm for the effort.

“I’m not worried about it,” Wagner said. “(Redistricting consultant Frederick) Kessler is fair, from what I understand.

“There are a couple of things I would have done differently but in the end he has to do what he has to do.”

Fellow first-term council member Goynes-Brown, who wriggled through her 2011 election victory by fewer than 100 votes, sounded equally conflicted about the move.

“It doesn’t make me nervous,” she said. “We won’t really know about the impact until we look at where, or in what precincts, we were successful last election.”

Nevada cities are allowed, but not legally required, to redraw city voting lines immediately after every 10-year census.

Wagner and Goynes-Brown said there wasn’t any single reason why the city waited four years after the most recent census to do so.

Some officials blamed past city leaders, including former Mayor Shari Buck, for failing to link up with the Clark County elections department in time to initiate a redistricting effort in 2011. Others pointed a lack of available census statistics needed to redraw city wards.

North Las Vegas’ latest redistricting push will cost the city an undisclosed fee awarded to redistricting consultant Kessler, the Wisconsin state legislator hired to give this week’s presentation.

Kessler declined to comment on how much he was being paid under his arrangement with the city.

If approved, he hopes North Las Vegas’ new ward maps will better reflect the city’s minority-dominated population.

“That’s what the Voting Rights Act requires,” Kessler said. “The rules differ depending on whether it’s a state or federal election, but local districts are supposed to be drawn within 10 percent (of population makeup).

“I try and keep it within 2 to 3 percent.”

Contact James DeHaven at jdehaven@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3839. Find him on Twitter: @JamesDeHaven.