Posted on 11/09/2005 3:57:40 PM PST by NormsRevenge
LOS ANGELES (AP) - Despite voters' rejection of Proposition 77, the Legislature's top leaders are promising to try to get a new plan on the ballot as early as next June that would strip lawmakers of the powerful job of drawing legislative and congressional districts.
"I'm more than open to a redistricting effort which takes the power to draw boundaries from the Legislature and gives it to a truly independent group," Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles, said Wednesday. He wouldn't discuss details but said a fresh proposal would be unveiled shortly.
Proposition 77, one of four initiatives on Tuesday's special election ballot that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger campaigned for, lost by more than 1.2 million votes.
It would have turned redistricting duties over to a panel of retired judges and required them to try to draw new districts in time for next June's primary, a timetable election officials said would be almost impossible to meet.
Lawmakers normally redraw districts at the beginning of each decade to reflect population changes revealed by a new national census. The process can decide which party dominates the Legislature and the state's congressional delegation and determine the fate of individual lawmakers.
Schwarzenegger said Proposition 77 would have ended the conflict of interest created by having legislators draw their own districts and make lawmakers more accountable to voters.
He complained that current districts, drawn after the 2000 census, were designed to protect incumbents in both parties.
Democrats, who dominate both houses of the Legislature, said the proposition was an attempt to elect more Republicans and compared it to the mid-decade Texas redistricting that cost Democrats four congressional seats last year.
"It looked a lot like what they did in Texas," said Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland. "I think the voters understood the fact that it was a power grab and they weren't interested."
But he said he was committed to putting a new redistricting measure on the ballot next year "so that California can be satisfied there's not going to be self-interest governing us."
That measure could be a constitutional amendment by state Sen. Alan Lowenthal, D-Long Beach, that's awaiting a vote next year in the Senate Appropriations Committee.
In its current form, it would create a seven-member commission to draw new districts after each census, starting in 2010. The governor, the Legislature's top four leaders, the California Judicial Council and University of California president would each appoint one commission member.
It passed the Senate elections committee in July, but then stalled when Democrats and Schwarzenegger couldn't work out compromises on redistricting and the other ballot measures pushed by the Republican governor.
If approved by lawmakers, it would go on the ballot next June or November.
Any deal on a redistricting measure could include an agreement that would liberalize lawmakers' term limits, which now allow senators to serve no more than 8 years, and Assembly members no more than 6 years.
Steve Poizner, the Silicon Valley millionaire who headed the Proposition 77 campaign for Schwarzenegger, said voters would have to pressure legislative leaders to be sure they follow through on their pledge to pass a new redistricting proposal.
"We have elevated the debate and set the table to pass a redistricting measure soon," he said. "The voters of California deserve no less."
I guess having him on the board ensures a liberal tilt to the balance.
Again, just like Prop 77, this would absolutely preclude the possibility of ANY CONSERVATIVE from ever serving on this commission... EVER!!!
That's what this and Prop 77 are all about is "Conservative Shut-Out!" It's dead wrong because of that!!!
So, I was thinking it guaranteed at least a 4-3 advantage to Democrats, no matter what, but not more than a 5-2 advantage.
We haven't had a Conservative Republican even as Governor, since Reagan!!! (actually, none prior to him either!)
But putting the UC President on the panel that selects the commission is stacking the deck. They might as well have put the President of the Sierra Club on the panel.
I'll offer another viewpoint as to why the proposed "deal" is suspect:
The sticking point in the failed negotiations mentioned in the article was the easing of term limits. Easing term limits is the prize. A prize that takes the cooperation of the electorate.
Democrats and their major contributors, the unions, opposed Prop 77, not because it would have a significant impact on political boundaries, it wouldn't, but because it didn't alter term limits either in its language or through a private deal with the governor whose persuasive voice was need to con the electorate.
Any change in redistricting is so tightly controlled by the Voting Rights Act that even a non partisan panel won't be able to release the stranglehold that the current flavor of political class has on California. That wasn't their objection to prop 77. The political class wants term limits eased so that their incumbencies can continue in perpetuity.
Prop 77 didn't accomplish that aim. The political class hopes that the combination of a weakened executive and the lingering will of the mob, in spite of Prop 77's defeat, will afford them the use of Schwarzenegger's celebrity to sell their scheme and banish the ghost of Willie Brown.
Instead of "blowing up those boxes," he built greater ones!!!
Yet some people on here cannot understand why I can't seem to support the Governor... Geeze!!!
The proposal being discussed here isn't the Governor's. It's one being proposed by a Democrat as a replacement for the defeated Prop 77. I don't know how similar it is, because I didn't really pay attention to the California ballot items in this election cycle.
My head hurts!
Yes, great news and also again place reform of the union political dues and the other issues again, and pile even more good stuff in initiatives again.
The unions borrowed their future to pay for the last election, let's bankrupt them and put a stake through their political hearts.
NO WAY.
Prop 77 made more sense. Both sides and the middle pick retired state (not fed, no 9th circus types) judges from a pre-qualified pool, each gets pre-emptory challenges and then the remaining judges are chosen from randomly. The judges' (one each: GOP, Dem and non-partisan) draw up new districts which then go before the voters.
Instead, this Dem's plan ensures a bi-partisan stranglehold on districts with Dems have a 5-2 advantage in drawing the lines.
Interesting. And Schwarzenegger's recent pledge of bipartisanship and to work together makes it appear he will be a willing participant.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1519140/posts
Prop 77 included federal judges.
Any commission drawing lines should include at least 5 people, IMO. Less is too vulnerable to corruption.
I'm sorry, but I take it personal when ANY elected official sets out to suffocate the economic activity in the area I live in and adds liberal layers of government over said area when government is already the only growth industry we have! (Now I just did something for your headache that I've never done for anyone else... I left off the 3 exclamation marks)
And Dog Gone, I'm sorry I switched subjects on you in the middle of this thread, but they're tightly connected in my tight headband!!! (Ooops! Sorry Ernest)
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