Drawing Lines
A Public Interest Guide To Real Redistricting Reform
February 1, 2005
By Ari Weisbard (Demos) and Jeannie Wilkinson (CGS)

View the document 2 (pdf)

A new report by Demos and the Center for Governmental Studies that shows that current (February 2005) legislation and proposed initiatives on redistricting in California all fail to sufficiently address the needs of the public, and suggests clear guidelines for much fairer redistricting. The report responds to the California State Legislature and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who are considering sweeping changes to the way California draws electoral district boundaries with several new proposals that would give redistricting authority to an "Independent Redistricting Commission" and take it away from partisan legislative control.

Introduction

California, like the rest of the country, has experienced a steady decline in the competitiveness of its congressional and state legislative electoral districts. In 2004, incumbents won every congressional and state election in which they ran, and only six of the state legislature's 100 races were truly competitive (a margin-of-victory of 10% or less.) Governor Schwarzenegger recently called a special legislative session to consider the adoption of an Independent Redistricting Commission to replace the legislature as the author of new legislative and congressional districts.

Experts cite redistricting -- the process of drawing new district lines to determine which residents will be grouped together when electing representatives -- as one of the causes of the declining number of competitive elections and, in some cases, of inequitable partisan legislative representation. The process, which usually takes place after each decennial census, is by its nature politically controversial. Many redistricting plans are met with charges that the revised congressional or state legislative districts -- which are routinely gerrymandered into improbable shapes and sizes -- are too partisan, too friendly to incumbents, not competitive enough and unrepresentative of minority populations. The courts are often drawn into the disputes when elected leaders (and electors) cannot agree and are forced to draw district lines themselves. When elected leaders choose their own constituencies instead of the reverse, it severely limits the power of the vote. Despite these drawbacks, most state legislatures still draw both congressional and state legislative districts themselves, but alternatives to this method are now being considered by a wide variety of individuals,public officials and public interest groups.

In recent months, several ballot initiatives and legislative bills have been introduced in California, all seeking to remove the legislature's power to implement redistricting. The approach proposed in all of these measures is to transfer responsibility from the legislature to an Independent Redistricting Commission. Proponents argue that a Commission will help eliminate some of the more egregious redistricting problems, thereby increasing representation, competitiveness and partisan fairness. Independent Redistricting Commissions have had mixed success overall, with some states experiencing increases in partisan fairness and competitiveness. A window of opportunity is opening for Californians to reflect on the problematic outcome of the current redistricting process and carefully consider what kind of proposal would be necessary to improve the next round of redistricting.