Despite intense lobbying from a cohort of Winter Park leaders, including its mayor, Orange County’s elected governing board on Tuesday adopted a new map of commission districts that lumps the wealthy and influential city with rural east communities — where its political power may be diminished.
But the decision was good news for many in Pine Hills, an unincorporated, low-income, heavily Black and Hispanic area that is split by the county’s existing map and preferred an alternative new district that both united the neighborhood and separated it from Winter Park.
The board’s 5-2 majority in favor of what was dubbed “Map 7B” included Commissioner Kelly Martinez Semrad, who retains a district similar to her current one with Winter Park and rural east Orange combined. Semrad lives in east Ora