Newport-Mesa school district to host 2 meetings this week on trustee boundaries
Two meetings this week will gather public input on the three proposed maps redrawing the Newport-Mesa Unified School District’s trustee area boundaries.
The first takes place from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday in the multipurpose room at Rea Elementary School, 661 Hamilton St., Costa Mesa.
The second is from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the lecture hall at Corona del Mar High School, 2101 Eastbluff Drive.
The school board will hold two additional public meetings before adopting a new trustee area boundary map.
In February, the board approved holding public hearings on the three adjusted boundaries maps to help make the seven trustee district zones more uniform in population following extensive population growth. And earlier this month, the board approved changing its voting system to trustee-area elections by November 2018 after settling a lawsuit that alleged the district’s current at-large voting system disenfranchised Latino voters.
Data presented to the board last year indicate some trustee areas had as many as 46,000 residents while others had around 16,000. The areas haven’t been altered since the school district formed 50 years ago, though the populations in each area have changed.
Map B, which a district committee prefers, aligns with city boundaries where possible and provides a clean look overall, officials said. In the preferred map, trustee areas 1, 2 and 7 are within Costa Mesa and areas 3, 4 and 5 are within Newport Beach.
The population goal for each zone is about 27,000, said Annette Franco, district spokeswoman.
Realignment of trustee areas would not affect school attendance boundaries.
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