CYPRESS CITY COUNCIL APPROVES TRANSITION TO BY-DISTRICT ELECTIONS;

INVITES COMMUNITY TO FIVE PUBLIC HEARINGS

At a January 10 special meeting, the Cypress City Council voted to initiate a transition from its existing at-large elections to by-district elections, marking a critical shift in the City's electoral landscape. The matter was continued from the City’s regular City Council meeting on Monday, January 8 to ensure all Council Members were able to deliberate this important issue in-person.

The City Council's decision seeks to resolve a lawsuit alleging Cypress’ at-large elections are not permitted by the California Voting Rights Act (CVRA). Despite the City's disagreement with the plaintiff's claims, the fact that no city has successfully defended a CVRA lawsuit, coupled with input from a mediator and a critical ruling involving the City of Santa Monica, dictated the transition to by-district elections.

Starting with the November 2024 election, each district will elect one Council Member who must reside in the district and be chosen exclusively by the voters living in the district. Residents will no longer have the power to vote for all Council Members. 

“This was a difficult settlement and one I personally disagree with,” said Mayor Scott Minikus. “Cypress has thrived with at-large elections. Democracy demands and our residents deserve to vote for all the Council Members who represent them. This new process, which is being forced on us by outsiders and special interests, means residents will only get to vote for one Council Member and only once every four years. However, I respect that the City Council concluded that fighting this lawsuit would be outrageously expensive with no possible successful conclusion. I am proud that we listened to the majority of our constituents who insisted we fight to keep Cypress whole, while most of the cities and school districts around us were forced to switch to districts. The settlement gives the City the ability to work with the community to establish our electoral map rather than have a court dictate the districts. We also won important protections against uncontested races that have plagued so many governments in Orange County recently.”

The City Council also hired a demographer, approved public outreach, and set a public hearing schedule to adopt an electoral map that will divide the City of Cypress into five districts.

As the City makes this critical change, residents are invited to participate in five upcoming public hearings that will create the map for Cypress’ first by-district City Council elections. The selection of the electoral map is vital as it will determine which neighborhoods and communities will be grouped for election purposes. During the public hearings, residents are encouraged to share how they think district boundaries should be established and will have the opportunity to submit their own maps for City Council consideration. Based on input received from the public and the demographer, the City Council will select a map by Monday, February 26, 2024.

Public hearings will be held:

• Monday, January 22, 2024
• Monday, January 29, 2024
• Monday, February 12, 2024
• Monday, February 26, 2024
• Monday, March 11, 2024

All Public hearings will be held at 6pm in the Council Chambers. Residents can attend the meeting in-person or participate virtually. For more details on how to participate in the public hearings, residents can visit www.cypressca.org/DistrictElections

It is anticipated that two districts will elect Council Members in November 2024, while the other three districts will elect Council Members in November 2026. This approach seeks to preserve the City's current Council Member election sequence and respects the terms voters elected Council Members to serve in the November 2020 and November 2022 elections. Council Members elected in November 2022 will serve out their terms as at-large representatives.