State GOP chairman assails redistricting panel, threatens referendum
By Timm Herdt
Ventura County Star
Posted July 14, 2011 at 5:25 p.m.
SACRAMENTO — On the day when the Citizens Redistricting Commission had originally planned to put out a second draft of proposed political district maps, the panel Thursday found itself under sharp partisan attack from the state Republican Party, whose chairman asserted its process had been "overtaken by partisanship and incompetence."
GOP Chairman Tom Del Beccaro said the party will attempt to qualify a referendum for the ballot to overturn the commission's final maps if they "remotely resemble the most recent visualizations."
Rather than formally release a second set of draft maps, commissioners have been working daily with their line-drawers to revise initial drafts in response to public comments. The modified maps, called "visualizations," are posted on the commission's website and will be the building blocks for the final plan, scheduled to be voted upon on July 28.
Commissioner Angelo Ancheta of San Francisco, who is serving as chairman this week under the panel's rotating schedule of leadership, rejected Del Beccaro's assertion that partisan considerations are influencing the map-making process.
"I don't think partisanship is playing any significant role within the commission's deliberations," he said. "We're all taking very seriously the legal requirement that we not look at where incumbents live or what the party registration is. We're very careful about that."
Ancheta said the decision to not release a second draft of proposed maps was driven by time constraints.
"What we're trying to do is meet the deadline," he said. "It reflects the fact that we face a lot of hard decisions and have an enormous amount of public commentary to absorb. It's not an attempt to somehow take public comment out of the process. We're remaining transparent while working through a lot of challenging questions."
Del Beccaro's threat of a potential referendum came a day after political analyst Tony Quinn, a former redistricting consultant to legislative Republicans, asserted the current Assembly visualizations would result in districts that would enable Democrats to reach a two-thirds majority.
The commission was created by a 2008 initiative strongly supported by the Republican Party. The measure, Proposition 11, took the authority to draw new political districts out of the hands of the Democratic-controlled Legislature. The 14-member panel has five Democrats, five Republicans and four members aligned with neither major party.
Its final maps must be approved by at least three members of each subgroup.
Del Beccaro, noting the party's past support for a citizen-based redistricting process, prefaced his criticism by saying, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
The visualizations for Central Coast districts posted over the last several days show some substantial changes to the draft maps released June 10. Among the changes are:
- A Ventura County congressional district that had included nearly all of the county except for Moorpark and Simi Valley has been revised to place Moorpark with the rest of the county. Simi Valley, however, remains detached from Ventura County and is placed in a district with Santa Clarita and the Antelope Valley.
GOP Chairman Tom Del Beccaro said the party will attempt to qualify a referendum for the ballot to overturn the commission's final maps if they "remotely resemble the most recent visualizations."
Rather than formally release a second set of draft maps, commissioners have been working daily with their line-drawers to revise initial drafts in response to public comments. The modified maps, called "visualizations," are posted on the commission's website and will be the building blocks for the final plan, scheduled to be voted upon on July 28.
Commissioner Angelo Ancheta of San Francisco, who is serving as chairman this week under the panel's rotating schedule of leadership, rejected Del Beccaro's assertion that partisan considerations are influencing the map-making process.
"I don't think partisanship is playing any significant role within the commission's deliberations," he said. "We're all taking very seriously the legal requirement that we not look at where incumbents live or what the party registration is. We're very careful about that."
Ancheta said the decision to not release a second draft of proposed maps was driven by time constraints.
"What we're trying to do is meet the deadline," he said. "It reflects the fact that we face a lot of hard decisions and have an enormous amount of public commentary to absorb. It's not an attempt to somehow take public comment out of the process. We're remaining transparent while working through a lot of challenging questions."
Del Beccaro's threat of a potential referendum came a day after political analyst Tony Quinn, a former redistricting consultant to legislative Republicans, asserted the current Assembly visualizations would result in districts that would enable Democrats to reach a two-thirds majority.
The commission was created by a 2008 initiative strongly supported by the Republican Party. The measure, Proposition 11, took the authority to draw new political districts out of the hands of the Democratic-controlled Legislature. The 14-member panel has five Democrats, five Republicans and four members aligned with neither major party.
Its final maps must be approved by at least three members of each subgroup.
Del Beccaro, noting the party's past support for a citizen-based redistricting process, prefaced his criticism by saying, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."
The visualizations for Central Coast districts posted over the last several days show some substantial changes to the draft maps released June 10. Among the changes are:
- A Ventura County congressional district that had included nearly all of the county except for Moorpark and Simi Valley has been revised to place Moorpark with the rest of the county. Simi Valley, however, remains detached from Ventura County and is placed in a district with Santa Clarita and the Antelope Valley.
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