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2008
Why Schwarzenegger's Redistricting Plan
Won't Work
California Majority Report.com
May 13, 2008
Tony Quinn: Redistricting Reform OK, But
It's Only A Start
Sacramento Bee
May 11, 2008
Governor May Face Donor Fatigue
Contra Costa Times
May 11, 2008
Dan Walters: Competing Proposals For Remap
Sacramento Bee
May 7, 2008
Initiative On Redistricting Closer To
Ballot
San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Nunez Pushes Ethics Plan As Rival Petitions
Are Filed
Sacramento Bee
May 7, 2008
To Get Leadership Reform, We First Need
Redistricting
Los Angeles Daily News
May 1, 2008
Good Intentions Could Harm Redistricting
Ballot Measure
Los Angeles Times
April 28, 2008
Redistricting On Track To Qualify,
Consultant Says
New America Foundation.com
April 23, 2008
Why Are GOP Contributors Putting Big Money
Into Redistricting Reform?
California Progress Report.com
April 19, 2008
Gov's
Giving To Remap Measure Tops $1 million
Sacramento Bee Capital Alert
April 21, 2008
‘Due
Process’ Democrats Have Their Heads Buried in the California Sand
California Progress Report.com
April 20, 2008
Opinion: Seeing The Light
Los Angeles Daily News
April 19, 2008
California
Voters FIRST Presents A Balanced And Bipartisan Effort For Redistricting
Reform
California Progress Report.com
April 17, 2008
Schwarzenegger's
Redistricting Plan Comes Under Fire
Contra Costa Times
April 17, 2008
Group Says Plan Will Put A Stop To
Gerrymandering
The Simi Valley Acron
April 4, 2008
The Need For Redistricting Reform From
This California Democrat’s Perspective
California Progress Report.com
April 4, 2008
Labor Says No To
Schwarzenegger/Republican/Common Cause Redistricting Measure
The California Majority Report.com
April 02, 2008
Revenge In Attack On Legislative
Redistricting?
California Progress Report.com
March 31, 2008
Weintraub: Governor Gets Another Shot At
Redistricting Reform
Sacramento Bee
March 30, 2008
Editorial: Can't Legislature Do Better Than
Bills On Dogs, Donkeys?
The Fresno Bee
March 30, 2008
Walters: Voters Irate At Budget Posturing
Sacramento Bee
March 28, 2008
New Foundation To Campaign For More Efficient
California Government
Sacramento Bee
March 27, 2008
Editorial: California Voters Should Support
Redistricting Ballot Measure
Fresno Bee
March 24, 2008
Editorial: Redraw the Map
Los Angeles Daily News
March 22, 2008
Walters: Court Ruling Offers Hope to
Dysfunctional California Politics
Sacramento Bee
March 19, 2008
Supreme Court to Hear Major Redistricting
Case
The Thicket at State Legislatures (ncsl.com)
March 18, 2008
Editorial: Let Citizens Redraw the Map
The Torrance Daily Breeze
March 17, 2008
Walters: Redistrict Reformers Miss Mark
Sacramento Bee
March 10, 2008
Let Citizens
Redraw Map
San Gabriel Valley Tribune
March 9, 2008
Governor Proposes Redistricting Ballot
Measure
North County Times
March 8, 2008
Redistricting Initiative Has Strong
Republican Backing
San Jose Mercury News
March 6, 2008
Governor Gathers Signatures to Qualify
Redistricting Measure
San Jose Mercury News
March 4, 2008
Manipulative Lawmakers Playing To The Crowd
Fresno Bee
February 14, 2008
State Voters Need To Do What Lawmakers
Won't
Los Angeles Daily News
February 14, 2008
Editorial: What We Need In Sacramento,
Redistricting, Not Retaliation
San Jose Mercury News
February 14, 2008
Redistricting Reform, Not Longer Terms, Is
The Answer
California Republic.org
February 12, 2008
The Buzz: A Hardball Tactic Could Ricochet
Sacramento Bee
February 11, 2008
Wake Up, Sacramento Media! Wake Up! Wake
Up! Wake Up!
San Diego Union Tribune
February 8, 2008
Editorial: Passive Aggressive Lawmakers
Just Play to the Crowd
Fresno Bee
February 8, 2008
Nunez Takes Blame For Prop. 93 Loss
Los Angeles Daily News
February 7, 2008
Weingand: Voters Got A Whiff and Said 'No'
Sacramento Bee
February 7, 2008
Lawmakers Believe In Term Limits But
Oppose The Measure
North County Times
February 4, 2008
Good For Us
Los Angeles Times
February 4, 2008
Commentary: A Conversation with Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger
Sacramento Bee
January 20, 2008
Walters: Two Party Structure Under Fire
Sacramento Bee
January 18, 2008
Walters: Governor's Brownian Flip-Flops
Sacramento Bee
January 16, 2008
Editorial: Corruption of a Good Idea
San Francisco Chronicle
January 15, 2008
Governor Supports Term Limit Measure
Sacramento Bee
January 15, 2008
A Deceptive Prop. 93
San Francisco Chronicle
January 10, 2008
Use Prop. 93 To Say 'No"
dailybreeze.com
January 3, 2008
more
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Why
Are G.O.P. Contributors Putting Big Money Into California
Redistricting ‘Reform’ - A Love of ‘Fairness’??
By Bill Cavala
California Progress Report.com
April 19, 2008
The Republicans have enlisted Common Cause and the League of Women
Voters in their campaign to take control of the Legislature through
redistricting.
The Governor has endorsed this plan – and the money behind it
is almost entirely Republican. They use the rhetoric of reform, but
be clear: this GOP money has one aim and intent, and that is GOP
control. Fellow-traveling Reformers would have you focus on the
process and not the product – but it’s the product that is
important. And that product is a passel more of Republican seats.
Enough GOP gains that the Democrats would have to sweep the table of
the marginal seats to maintain their majority.
Let’s look at the product, seat by seat.
Assembly District 1. Following the Constitution, the Legislature
began in the upper left hand side of California with Del Norte.
Then, running down the coast, added counties (Humboldt, Mendocino)
until reaching Sonoma where the liberal areas around the Russian
River made it a Democratic seat. Lake County, heavy in retired
seniors, and Trinity, insignificant in population, were also added.
But the move into Sonoma isn’t necessary. A movement East, into
Shasta, is more symmetrical and the likely direction a Commission
would take. This shifts the seat from one dominated by coastal
environmentalists to one dominated by the economics of timber. A
Democrat supporting coastal environmentalists would lose to a
Republican backing the timber economy. A Democrat who tried to hold
centrist voters would lose 12-15% of the vote (and the election) to
a ‘Green’ party candidate. (Cf. Doug Bosco)--and, in any case,
adding 30 Dem, 48 Rep. registration in Shasta would finish the job:
(minus 1)
Assembly District 17 includes the entire County of Merced, some
sheep farms along I-5 in Stanislaus County that connect the seat to
Tracy in San Joaquin. It slides along the Delta to Stockton –
where it takes in the ‘old’ portion of town (primarily African
American).
Any Commission would simply make San Joaquin into a seat. At 40%
Republican, it would elect a Republican Supervisor. Merced, a title
V county, would have to be attached to Kings County (also title V)
and to the heavily Hispanic (but non- voting) census tracts
containing small farm worker communities in Stanislaus, Tulare and
Fresno Counties. The result would be a Hispanic, Republican district
– the top of the current 30th AD. (minus 2)
Assembly District 30 would recede entirely within Kern County and
become safely Republican. (minus 3)
Assembly District 31, the Fresno City based seat would remain so.
But growth in the surrounding suburbs will make this a GOP seat that
would resist even Democratic line drawers in 2011. (minus 4)
The decision not to move AD 7 into Vallejo has the ripple effect
of pushing all of the seats on the Coast and the SF Peninsula
“downward”. From a partisan perspective this means the
disconnect of Santa Cruz from the Monterey Peninsula (a move made by
the Court Masters in 1991 and reversed after a masterful plea by
then Assemblyman Sam Farr). Farr will fail in 2011. The peninsula
can’t be connected to the Salinas Valley for Title V reasons –
so it will be joined with San Louis Obispo. This makes the 27th AD
Republican (minus 5)
The 35th Assembly District current stretches along the coast from
the Hispanic half of Oxnard City to just South of Santa Maria. Any
Commission would simply include the whole of Santa Barbara as a
seat. With a 41-35 registration, this is a marginal seat. (Dems
could lose a seat)
Assembly District 53 takes the heavily Republican Palos Verdes
peninsula and attaches it to a Democratic cut of Long Beach via the
old port area of San Pedro in Los Angeles. A Commission would simply
add Anglo Long Beach tracts to this otherwise Anglo seat with the
result being the loss of a marginal district and the creation of a
safe Republican one. (minus 6)
Assembly District 61 is anchored in Los Angeles by the heavily
Democratic City of Pomona. A Commission would avoid this County
split pushing AD 61 entirely into San Bernardino County (38 Dem, 41
Rep). (minus 7)
Assembly District 62 would include the San Bernardino not put
into AD 61 and Riverside population to make up the difference. It is
unclear what the result would be – either a marginal seat or a
safe Republican seat. (Dems could lose one).
Assembly District 78 would surely gain the Anglo city of Coronado
from the otherwise Hispanic AD 79th - which would likely add
African-American population from the current AD 76 to make up for
the loss of Coronado. This would make the 76th – currently a
marginal seat held by Republicans a Republican seat. The 76th,
currently a safe Democratic seat would become marginal (Dems could
lose one).
So the Governor’s Commission would move 7 seats from Dem to Rep
and move three seats from Dem to ‘undecided’. That puts the
party balance at 38 Dem and 39 Republican. Assuming the Contra Costa
based AD 15 remained a marginal (albeit Republican held seat),
Democrats would have to win three of the four ‘competitive’
seats to retain a one-vote majority in the Assembly.
(And, note that there are 6 competitive or marginal seats in the
plan drawn by the Legislature: AD 15, 17, 30, 31, 78, 80 and only
four likely to be produced by any commission)
The League of Women Voters and Common Cause could care less if
Republicans gained control of the Legislature. Well, I’m a
Democrat and I think turning the state over to the GOP (they already
have the Governor) would be a disaster for public education, for the
poor, and for the environment. No true progressive should endorse a
process that produces such a disgusting product.
Bill Cavala was Deputy Director of the Assembly Speaker’s
Office of Member Services where he worked for over 30 years.
He attended undergraduate and graduate school in the 1960’s
and received a doctorate in political science at UC Berkeley. He
taught political science at UC Berkeley during the 1970's while he
worked part-time for the State Assembly.
Cavala left teaching at UC Berkeley and went to work for
Assembly Speaker Willie Brown in 1981 until his tenure as Speaker
ended in 1995, and he has worked for his five successors as Speaker
up to and including Speaker Fabian Nunez.
Mr. Cavala manages election campaigns for Democratic
candidates.
Posted on April 19, 2008
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