Schwarzenegger redistricting rejected

[robertarctor]

Story here: http://www.salon.com/wire/ap/archive.html?wire=D8BSIM6G0.html

August 09,2005 | SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- A state appeals court on Tuesday refused to put Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempt to change the redistricting process back on November's special election ballot.

The measure seeks to take away state lawmakers' power to draw congressional and legislative boundaries in California and instead shift that responsibility to a panel of retired judges.

Supporters of the plan used two versions of the ballot initiative during the certification process, though. That was a "clear violation of the constitutional and statutory procedures for the circulation of an initiative petition," the 3rd District Court of Appeal wrote in its 2-1 decision. ...

[KeepItReal]

1. Sweet!! Is that the end of this stealth redistricting crap?

<eom>

[Initech]

2. Take that GOP!!!

Ha ha, Orange County may be conservative, but at least the whole state isnt going to be!

VICTORY!!!!

[BlakeB]

3. Good luck in 2006 Arnold!

Haha... he doesn't have a chance.

[Oerdin]

4. I would like to see

Redistricting taken out of the hands of politicians at sometime in the future though. It doesn't make sense for us to allow interested parties to gerrymander their own districts. That is just ripe for abuse and encourages extremism.

[Luminous Animal]

7. It would be great if progressives and democrats

would come up with their own redistricting reform initiative like they have done in Ohio.

http://www.reformohionow.org/

[Cleita]

5. Great isn't it?

I hope they reject doing a special election too. It's just nonsense to do so.

[Oerdin]

8. There is little point now.

This was the flag ship item for which the special election was being held. It's their own fault for screwing up the wording and now what is left to go on the special election? The one about teacher tenure?

[ronnykmarshall]

6. Ahhhhhhh pooor Arnie!

My cousin lives in Sacramento, he and his boyfriend says that Arnie is hardly ever in town. Most of the locals are sick of him.

[Peggy Day]

9. Not so fast

Today's CC Times says it is back on. Darn!!!!! I sure hope it doesn't pass.

[Oerdin]

10. It is back on.

The state supreme court ruled that the differences in wording were not misleading so there is no reason to not allow it on the ballot.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/state/20050813-9999-1n13ballot.html

In my mind it is clear that incumbents have rigged the system to their benefit and that really does harm voters by robbing them of choice. As a left of center Clinton style Democrat I also like the idea that this will force both parties to move closer to the center and to be less partisan. Those politicians in both parties who act like partisan hacks will find they no longer live in safe district so we'll hopefully see less grandstanding.

In the long run I think this will be good for the Democratic Party here in California. There will be some unhappy incumbents if this thing passes but it will allow for more voices to be heard and for new candidates to more easily challenge incumbents. It will also make it much easier for voters to kick out a politician they don't like and that isn't a bad thing.

[cascadiance]

11. I disagree...

I think this is part of the problem with the proposition process. It preys on people's emotions that rallies them to vote emotionally and not on what the proposition really tries to do.

I, like you, would like to have a better system to do redistricting, but there is a better time and a better implementation to introduce reform for this. We should be looking for a solution that takes away the human element of deciding details of districting and try to build up a solution that uses more agreed-upon rules (much like our nation uses laws instead of individuals deciding on how to dispense justice to help keep law and order). By shifting this decision process over to judges, I don't think we're solving the fundamental problems and maybe introducing new ones. And to be honest, like many here, I simply don't trust what may be going on under the covers from a Republican here.

We have an existing system that probably does reward incumbents more than it should. Perhaps it also rewards Democrats more than it should too. But before we replace it, let's take care and replace it with something that improves the situation and doesn't make it worse than it is already. How do we decide which judges should be used to draw up these district lines? What do they use as criteria for doing so?

Vote NO on this proposition! There is some hidden agenda going on here!

[Oerdin]

12. You've asked what the criteria will be and how a judge gets nominated

So I will try to answer those questions for you. The full text of Proposition 77 is located

http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:jtpmYyyiZFoJ:ag.ca.gov/initiatives/pdf/sa2004rf0037_amdt_1_ns.pdf+Prop.+77+text&hl=en]

and I do hope you decide to read it since it spells the exact changes and the process out in great detail.

That's a PDF file so I can't cut and past it but in order to qualify (section 1.2A) the judge must never have held a partisan political office, worked for a political party, they can't have switched parties since becoming a judge, the judge must be retired and no longer sitting on the bench, and the 24 seat panel must have no more or less then 12 representatives from the two biggest political parties in the state. The judges themselves are decided by drawing lots between themselves. The judges themselves must swear in writing to not run for an elected office for 5 years after taking part in the panel (section 1.2b).

From this pool of 24 judges the state Judicial council, along with majority and minority leaders of both the state senate and the state assembly will unanimously select three judges, called special masters, to preside over the redistricting; all three judges may not be from the same political party. If those people cannot settle upon three judges with in the required time period then three judges will be drawing from the pool of 24 by drawing lots (section 1.2D).

That's how the "special Masters" get decided upon but what are the criteria for creating districts? Simple, from section 2. All districts must have equal population or nearly equal with in 1% of each other, all districts must be contiguous (no more of these leap frog districts), districts must conform to city/county boundaries where ever possible (the order of importance is 1) create the most whole counties possible 2) create the fewest county fragments possible 3) create the most whole cities possible 4)create as few city fragments as possible), districts should be as geographically compact as possible (no more snake like districts like the one in western Santa Barbara and southern SLO counties), US census blocks must stay as united as possible. In addition, no consideration may be given to how the redistricting will effect political parties, past voting records of citizens may not be used while drawing up districts and party affiliation of voters may not be considered.

I can understand the fears some people have about Republicans potentially gerrymandering districts but if anything this will make it much harder for parties to gerrymander things. When in doubt I find reading the original wording of the proposition and its exact phrasing helps and I hope others do read it before making up their minds.

[Oerdin]

13. Those of you who don't want prop 77 should be happy.

Having won in court, the governor now has a significant task ahead to get voters to back the initiative. Californians have rejected four redistricting initiatives since 1982, and in June, a Field Poll showed Proposition 77 well short of a majority. Only 35 percent of Californians deemed likely to vote said they would vote yes on the measure while 46 percent of likely voters said they would reject Proposition 77, and 19 percent were undecided.

Generally, support for ballot measures fades during campaigns.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-redistrict13aug13,0,7790867.story?coll=la-home-headlines

[Peggy Day]

14. huh!

I'll be open minded, but forgive me if I am a bit skeptical, OK?
What is the Democratic Party's stand on this?

[Oerdin]

15. I don't know.

Maybe someone coul look it up. The Republicans are for this because the state has been gerrymandered in our favor and they believe that in a fair fight they'll win more seats. I believe that in a fair fight we'll still do very well plus we'll elect better people to represent our party and we'll gain a great moral hammer to beat over the Republicans' heads when ever they pull a Texas style gerrymandering. With enough media attention and moral outrage we might even be able to force them into ungerrymandering Texas.

To do that though we have to have the moral high ground and we can't be damning them with one hand and doing the same thing with the other. In short we need to put our on house in order to we can shame them into doing the same.

[lwin]

16. NO on 77

To those of you who think the redistricting could be a good thing for the Dems...GET REAL. Do you really think Arnold would push early redistricting, outside of the normal census process, if it could in any way benefit Dems?

Haven't some of you learned yet that no matter how much lipstick you put on that pig, he's still a pig?

Here is the official CA Dem Party take on all the Propositions:

http://www.cadem.org/site/c.jrLZK2PyHmF/b.953879/k.971A/Special_Election.htm

Here is the link on 77, in detail:

http://www.noonproposition77.com/

[Oerdin]

17. Oh, it will hurt the party in the short term.

My position is that it is in our long term strategic interests to ungerrymander things and lead by example. We will never effectively convince anyone of our views while we act as corruptly as the Republicans act. We're going to have to be the ones to take the moral high ground and act first if we want to convince people that we really are the morally superior choice.

The bonus is it makes it much easier for voters to kick out people they don't like and for us to elect new politicians to replace tired old incumbants who spend more time worrying about fund raising then they do about advancing the party or speaking out about our policies. This will be good for democratic leaning people in the long run though it will hurt incumbants who rely on gerrymandered districts.