Some people say a neighborhood is better defined by the residents who live, work and play there than by physical boundaries, lines on a map or the number of inhabitants.

Just ask the people who live in Oak Park – or Elmhurst, or Med Center or Tahoe Park.

Glenn Corngold, an Elmhurst resident who spoke at the Aug. 23 City Council meeting, told council members, “Med Center’s dirt is in our yard. It’s our neighborhood.”

As the once-a-decade redistricting process for Sacramento comes to a close, there has been a lot of emotion, protest – and, yes, drama – focused on the redrawing of district lines that would shift the UC Davis Medical Center from District 5, where it has been since it was built in 1978, to District 6.

As drawn on the official city of Sacramento map, the Med Center campus lies within the Med Center neighborhood, which is bordered to the north and east by Elmhurst and to the west and south by Oak Park.

Councilman Kevin McCarty said that because the Med Center is physically “attached” to the Elmhurst neighborhood to a much larger degree than it is to Oak Park, then the council member who represents the Med Center should be the one associated with the neighborhood that is most impacted by its proximity to the center.

“There’s no question the Med Center is part of this (Elmhurst) neighborhood,” McCarty said Monday. “Or, at least, it’s more closely associated to this side of Stockton Boulevard than to Oak Park.”

Stockton Boulevard is a heavily traveled, five-lane road that bisects the Med Center neighborhood – and physically separates the Med Center from Oak Park and homes and businesses on the west side of the street.

But seeing homes, parks and businesses through the car window at street level is strikingly different than what appears on a map on the wall – and Elmhurst residents say they need to be represented by someone who sees their neighborhood the same way they do.

In an Aug. 14 email to the City Council, Elmhurst resident Diane Cummins told council members that there are a number of issues that directly impact the Elmhurst neighborhood and affect the quality of life for the residents.

“It seems most logical to me,” Cummins said in the email, “that the Med Center and the Med Center Neighborhood remain in District 6, which would link those areas with Elmhurst.”

Elmhurst resident Jeff Simon described in a letter to council members that noise from ambulances, helicopters and other medical vehicles can be heard “at any hour of the day or night,” despite the double-pane windows installed in his home to diminish the noise.

Simon also described traffic congestion, limited parking, and hospital employees and emergency room visitors smoking and littering in his front yard.

“The impact that UCDMC has on us is – to say the least – extraordinary,” Simon added.

Simon agreed with Cummins and other Elmhurst residents who said they want “to have an arbiter of sorts,” and “a single source” to turn to.

“Where the line is drawn is no matter,” Simon said, “other than we wish to be in the same district as the Med Center campus so our common council representative can decisively and quickly address the issues that impact us.”

McCarty said that, by redistricting the Med Center into District 6 alongside Elmhurst, he is “focusing on practical issues.”

“We make our decisions on sound public policy, not on emotion,” McCarty said. “Certainly emotion is a factor, but what is the best public policy?”

McCarty said that if there was a “big economic dollar factor” that went with the district, it would be a consideration. Failing that, “neighborhood issues reign supreme.”

“I hear the emotion (of Oak Park residents),” McCarty said, “but I think we need to focus on the facts and public policy and what’s practical.”

“What we’re feeling in Elmhurst,” Corngold said at the Aug. 23 meeting, “is a need for representation.”

Corngold described the traffic and noise from construction at the Med Center and said, “We can’t just walk into the (Med Center) building and ask them to do something about it.

“We want to be in the same district as the Med Center so we can have someone to speak for us,” Corngold said. “Whatever (the Med Center district) is in, I’d like to be part of it.”

For the 2,000 residents in Elmhurst, according to McCarty, “it complicates things when the councilman for the hospital and their own councilman are two different people. It’s an unnecessary extra layer of bureaucracy.”

The real problem, according to R.E. Graswich, special assistant to Mayor Kevin Johnson, is not an “extra layer of bureaucracy,” rather a divided council.

“Unlike Sutter, Mercy and Kaiser hospitals, which require permits and entitlements from the city, UCDMC needs no city permits and entitlements,” Graswich said. “To be a successful neighbor with UCDMC, the city must rely upon relationships built between city officials and UCDMC officials. A divided council does not bode well for relationships.”

If UCDMC is returned to District 5, Graswich said a 9-0 council vote on the base map could be expected.

“Politically (and realistically) speaking, it’s indescribably better to have a 9-0 vote than a bitterly divided 6-3 vote,” Graswich said.

The Med Center has been referred to as an "economic engine" many times throughout the redistricting process – so, what economic advantage does the Med Center really bring to Oak Park or Elmhurst if it is drawn into either district?

According to McCarty, there is none.

“None. Zero,” McCarty said Wednesday. “It is an economic engine to the region, jobs and it has an impact on community health. But advantage to the district? No.”

Graswich said he disagreed.

“Economic benefits are obvious,” Graswich said in an email Wednesday. “The Med Center employs approximately 7,000 people, bringing jobs and support services to a neighborhood that has been steadily rebounding from challenging economic conditions for 50 years.”

Councilman Jay Schenirer, the current council representative of District 5 and one of the three council members who voted against the current base map, said the Med Center does have economic benefits to the neighborhood.

“The feeling of Oak Park and how it’s been developing is important,” Schenirer said. “(The neighborhood) is on a move upward, and (the Med Center) is one of the main assets that they can claim in their neighborhood.”

Despite McCarty’s argument that the practical matters from being adjacent to the Med Center are the most important, Graswich and others – including Mike Boyd, president of the Oak Park Neighborhood Association – have questioned what appears to be a “power grab” by McCarty.

“There is no impact (from shifting districts) on the redistricting map in terms of numbers,” Boyd said, “so it must be political.”

“(Oak Park) has for decades been treated as the poor part of the family,” Boyd said. “We’ve (been) the ones (everyone) can take advantage of.”

“No one reached out to Oak Park to ask what (residents) felt about it,” Boyd said.

“I have no comment on McCarty’s motives,” Schenirer said, “but the fact that neither (Elmhurst nor Oak Park) was consulted before the (Neighborhoods 2.0) plan was laid out is telling. No one who drew these maps talked to the community about how (residents) felt about it.”

“It has unnecessarily pitted one neighborhood against the other,” Schenirer said.

As far as the Med Center is concerned, the district it is located in makes no difference to the work the center does – or to the benefit it provides to the region.

Robert Waste, assistant director of government and community relations for the UC Davis Health System and the Med Center, said Wednesday that the issue of redistricting is “a determination for the City Council to make.”

“We work with all of the council districts,” Waste said. “Our buildings and our operations deal extensively with all of these council districts on a range of issues from schools to workforce development.”

“There has been a neighborhood task force which has ebbed and flowed over the years, and we use it and will continue to use it in the future to solve problems.”

Waste said the task force was initiated by the Med Center to work with “all neighborhoods in every direction of the compass.”

Waste declined to comment further on any opinion or preference for which district the Med Center should be located in.

“We’ve had a neutral position (on this issue) from day one,” Waste said. “Our business is patient care and health, and we’re going to stay out of the politics and stick to our mission.”

“Some people speaking at the last council meeting said they felt they were ‘losing’ the Med Center,” McCarty said, “but the center is not moving. It will still be right where it sits.”

McCarty noted that the district the Capitol building is in has changed, and so has the district that includes the Sac State campus.

“Boundaries change,” McCarty said. “Population changes. It happens.

“I stand by this map,” McCarty said, “and I stand by my constituents who think there is a crystal-clear link between the Elmhurst neighborhood and the Med Center.”

“I thought (having the Med Center in District 5) was a flaw in the 2001 redistricting,” McCarty said, “and I think it should be corrected now.”

Oak Park residents and community leaders will hold a Unity March at 6 p.m. on Thursday to protest the proposed new district lines. The march will start at the Sacramento Food Bank (3333 3rd Ave.) and end at the UC Davis Medical Center.

The final vote on the new redistricting map is set for Sept. 6.

Melissa Corker is a Staff Reporter for The Sacramento Press. Follow her on Twitter @MelissaCorker.