Bid to add new minority seat to BESE could spark controversy during redistricting session | Education – New Orleans, Louisiana – Eminetra

There is controversy over a new constituency change as civil rights groups call on the state’s primary and secondary school board to add another minority seat.

Jim Garvey, president of BESE, said he and the other 11 members of the board are generally happy with the current boundaries that have been in effect for the past decade.

However, critics say black students make up almost half of the state’s public school population, but only 27% of BESE members, so the composition of BESE needs to be changed. ..

Linda Johnson, chairman of the board in 2010, subsequently tried to increase the number of seats in the minority, but said her efforts were determined and did not gain momentum. “I wish I could have elected a BESE member to represent the ethnic minorities in Louisiana,” said Johnson, who lives in Plaquemine.

The board of directors, which oversees public schools throughout the state, consists of eight elected members and members nominated by three governors.

The current lineup includes two majority minority districts, where black residents, who make up the minority of the state’s population, make up the majority of the BESE district.

They are District 8 owned by Preston Castille in Baton Rouge and District 2 owned by Kira Orange Jones in New Orleans.

One of BESE’s three appointed members is a minority. That is, 27% of the board is represented by black officials.

Black residents make up about 31% of Louisiana’s population and 48% of students attending public schools.

“Currently, the color community is very undervalued at BESE,” said Michael Pernick, a New York City lawyer who is reorganizing the lawyers at NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.

Pernick’s group and 14 others have submitted their request to add BESE’s third minority seat to the House and Senate committees that oversee the re-electoral district.

Others behind the push are the NAACP Louisiana State Council, the Louisiana Urban League, the Louisiana Women’s Voters Federation, the Louisiana ACLU, and a national non-profit group working for the minority and low-income earners. Includes a state branch of an Education Trust-earning students.

Governor John Bel Edwards and Cleo Fields, chairman of the Senate Board of Education at Baton Rouge, are both Democrats and have expressed support for the Third Minority District.

A special session is scheduled for February 1-20 to redraw the lines for the Legislature delegation, the Legislature, BESE, and the Civil Service Committee.

The controversy over BESE adds to another push to add a second minority seat to the six-member house delegation in Louisiana.

Letters from 15 groups state that failure to add a third minority seat to the eight elected slots is likely to violate the 1965 Federal Voting Rights Act.

Black and Latin communities in northern Louisiana say they are dispersed in such a way that minority voters deny the right to elect candidates of their choice in the two districts.

District 4, northwestern Louisiana, is represented by Republican Michael Melerine. It works with Alan Seabaugh, a Shreveport lawyer and R-Shreveport state legislator. Caucasian residents occupy 54% of the district.

District 5 in northeastern Louisiana is owned by Republican Ashley Ellis. Caucasian residents make up 59% of the area.

Melerine and Ellis are members of the whiteboard.

The group says that BESE is unfair to the COVID-19 rule, how the national racial history is taught, to black and Latin students, who make up 2% of the public school population, academically. He said the imbalance was particularly terrible, as he was discussing issues such as accountability rules.

“BESE considers a very important issue for the color community,” Pernick said.

According to Garvey, BESE members were asked for feedback a few months ago by R-Crawley’s House of Representatives John Stefanski and the chairman of the Government Affairs Committee.

The House Committee is one of the two constituency change committees in the Legislature.

“In my understanding, most members accepted the invitation, but other than” we like our district and I think it’s great, so far as you can keep them pretty. ” I didn’t have much to say, “Garvey said. Metairie’s lawyer.

Castille said he had a good conversation with Stefanski and liked the idea of ​​a third seat in the minority.

“If possible, it would certainly be related to the state’s population,” he said.

Fifteen groups submitted two proposed maps that produced the third minority seat among the elected BESE members.

In one scenario, the new majority-minority lineup includes District 2, Kira Orange Jones, District 5, Ashley Ellis, and District 7 in southwestern Louisiana.

The district of Ellis ranges from 59% white residents to nearly 51% ethnic minorities. Boffy ranges from almost 71% white residents to 55% black and Latino residents.

Ellis is in her first term, and Orange Jones and Boffy are in their last term.

Other proposed 3 minority settings are Orange Jones and Ellis, and Castile 8.