VIDALIA — After three straight weeks of meeting, the Concordia Parish Police Jury is still without a redistricting plan.

The jury had its regularly scheduled meeting Monday night to discuss the issue, and once again questions concerning District 2 kept the plan away from a vote.

Oliver Schulz of Oliver Schulz and Associates and engineering services said there are only two changes that have to be made to redistrict the parish.

The first recommended change by Schulz would be to move people from District 4 to District 5-A.

The proposed area that would move into District 5-A would be the area from Rabb Road to Levens Addition Road.

“Everything inside of this area is moving into District 5-A,” he said.

No members of the jury objected to this plan, which Schulz said would make both districts ideal in population size.

The second proposed change was to add more people into District 2 from District 3.

Schulz recommended that the Vidalia Meadows and Vidalia Manor apartment complexes on U.S. 84 be moved into District 2 from District 3, adding a total number of 119 people into the district.

District 2, which is a minority district, would contain 31 percent white population and a 66.74 percent black population with the addition of the apartment complexes.

In the state of Louisiana a district must contain at least 55 percent of a minority to be considered a minority district.

District 2 juror Willie Dunbar discussed concerns over the plan and the lack of additional black voters old enough to vote he would receive, so Schulz suggested adding an additional area of the parish into District 2.

Schulz recommended that Riverside Drive also be added to Dunbar’s district to help give him additional minority numbers.

Dunbar said there are approximately 10 to 15 houses on the road with the majority of the residents being black.

Dunbar said he needed more time to review the plan before he made his decision, and Schulz said there was not much more he could do to rearrange Dunbar’s district because of the lack of black residents living outside of District 2.

Dunbar also said he would not approve the plan until he was told the amount of registered voters that live in the two apartment complexes projected to enter into his district.

Schulz and Concordia Parish Registrar of Voters Golda Ensminger left the meeting to search the registrar’s office for the information.

After 20 minutes of waiting, Ensminger returned with the information.

Vidalia Manor and Vidalia Meadows had 33 registered voters during last year’s election, and none of them voted, Ensminger said.

After hearing the information, Dunbar said he would still like some more time to review the plans.

The plan to add Riverside Drive and the two apartment complexes into Dunbar’s district was the second plan Schulz recommended to the jury to solve the District 2 problem.

Two weeks ago Schulz suggested that the area of North Hickory and Stampley Streets in Vidalia move into District 2 from District 3, but Dunbar also objected to those plans.

Jury President Melvin Ferrington said a decision needs to be made soon, because the deadline for the redistricting plan is coming up fast.

“We are on the short end of getting this done,” he said

Ferrington said a public hearing for the proposed plan is scheduled for June 13, after which the jury will vote on the plan.

Schulz said while the deadline for the redistricting plan is coming up, a vote at the June 13 meeting would give the jury plenty of time to submit its proposal.