Despite requests from more than 20 civic groups that she keep recruiting applicants for the California Citizens Redistricting Commission past the present Aug. 9 deadline, state Auditor Elaine Howle doesn’t appear to believe it is necessary. 

Last week, California Common Cause, the California NAACP and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials were among the organizations that asked that the deadline be moved to Sept. 30. They cited statistics showing that whites were heavily overrepresented in the first 7,500 applicants, that Latinos and Asian Americans were heavily underrepresented, and that women were somewhat underrepresented.

“California voters only get one shot every 10 years to draw the lines that shape our future,” their letter to Howle said. “We, the people, want a chance to make a real impact for our families, neighborhood and state.”

Common Cause chief says applicants not diverse enough

Rey Lopez-Calderon, executive director of California Common Cause, told the San Francisco Chronicle that the redistricting commission had gotten a much worse response than in its recruitment efforts before the 2010 census, when there were about 30,000 applicants. That was the first time the commission handled redistricting after being created by Proposition 11, a 2008 ballot measure that put the state auditor’s office in charge of setting up the commission.

“We need differing views on the commission, and not just ethnic views,” Lopez-Calderon said. “[We] need people who know the different parts of the state.”

But in a news release on Tuesday, Howle didn’t address or give any credence to the civic groups’ concerns.

“I am pleased to announce that as of this morning, over 10,300 Californians have stepped forward for a chance to serve on the second 14-member Citizens Redistricting Commission,” Howle’s statement said. “This is great news for direct democracy! As we enter the final days of the initial application period, my staff and I will continue working to encourage even more eligible individuals throughout the state to apply.”

After applications close, Howle’s office expects to come up with a list of 40 finalists by next April. The committee’s 14 members will be chosen by Aug. 15, 2020. Under the rules of Proposition 11, the commission includes five Democrats, five Republicans and four people who are independents, decline to state a party preference or are members of another party. 

U.S. Supreme Court: Partisan gerrymandering allowed

The ballot measure was passed over the bipartisan objections of most of the state’s political establishment at the behest of then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and good-government groups. They successfully argued that the task should be taken away from the state Legislature because it had long since proven it drew election district boundaries to protect incumbents. In 2004, for example, not a single one of California’s then-51 House seats changed parties.

But the belief that partisan gerrymandering is fundamentally bad and must be avoided took a huge blow from the U.S. Supreme Court in June. On a 5-4 vote, the court’s conservative majority declined to force changes to extreme gerrymanders adopted by Republican lawmakers in North Carolina and by Democratic lawmakers in Maryland.

“We conclude that partisan gerrymandering claims present political questions beyond the reach of the federal courts,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote. “Federal judges have no license to reallocate political power between the two major political parties, with no plausible grant of authority in the Constitution, and no legal standards to limit and direct their decisions.” 

What shaped up as another bruising ballot battle between union and business coalitions over worker pay, benefits and obligations has fizzled with Proposition 11.

The measure was funded by the companies which provide the private ambulance services which provide the majority of such services in the state. These companies, led by American Medical Response, were responding to the fallout from a 2016 California Supreme Court ruling which held that private security guards couldn’t be compelled to remain on call during their breaks.

This led some paramedics and emergency medical technicians (EMTs) to sue in state court, arguing that they were also covered by this ruling and shouldn’t be compelled to remain on call during their breaks. Private ambulance firms noted that traditionally in California, all first responders – public or private – have been on call during breaks.

These firms warned state lawmakers that having to add ambulances and paramedics and EMTs so they can provide minimum service during break times could cost up to $100 million a year – costs that would be passed on to taxpayers by local governments which rely on private ambulances and on to residents via increases in their health insurance rates.

But after the Legislature decided not to step in, private ambulance firms paid millions of dollars to signature gatherers to gain a spot on the ballot for what became Proposition 11. It would write into state law the obligation that private first responders must be on call during breaks and limit the liabilities faced by ambulance companies for lawsuits filed before the ballot initiative was launched late last year.

No one filed ballot argument against measure

The response from the California labor establishment has been surprisingly passive. While some have written opinion pieces with sharp criticism of Proposition 11 – calling it bad for public safety, an abuse of the initiative process and a corporate power play – none of these arguments were put directly before the large number of state voters who for generations have relied on the official state voters guide in making up their minds on ballot propositions. Prepared by the Secretary of State’s Office, the guide for Nov. 6 elections notes that no one – not a labor group or a paramedic or someone with an ax to grind about private ambulance firms – submitted an argument opposing Proposition 11 or provided a website or additional information on why it should be opposed (pictured).

This is unusual in California direct democracy. But when it comes to a seemingly high-stakes battle involving union members and big business, it appears to have no modern precedent.

Proponents of the measure say Proposition 11 might not be popular with union rank-and-file members because it includes concessions that haven’t gotten much attention from the media. It would require ambulance providers to provide ambulance staffers with a range of mental-health services, including up to 10 paid visits a year to clinics or hospitals.

But the main theory in political circles is that in a year in which the U.S. Supreme Court has said public employees can decline to pay dues to their unions, a fight against a well-funded, widely endorsed ballot measure that preserves the status quo for the union members if affects isn’t a high priority.

By JOHN HRABE

Parents and gamblers have a hard time being objective.

“If you ever put that much money on a pony, you kind of like it when it rounds home,” the self-described “proud father” of the Citizens Redistricting Commission, Charles T. Munger Jr., told a redistricting conference last September. Munger financed the Proposition 11 and Proposition 20 initiatives that instituted the commission.

Last month, Munger’s problem child received an undeserved stamp of approval from the California Supreme Court. Or, if you prefer the gambling analogy, the commission’s maps won because all other maps were disqualified as illegitimate contenders. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court’s decision is rewriting the redistricting history to eliminate all mention of the commission’s flubs. “The Commission-certified Senate districts also are a product of what generally appears to have been an open, transparent and nonpartisan redistricting process as called for by the current provisions of article XXI,” the court wrote in the first draft of California’s redistricting history.

That might be the worst unintended consequence of the court’s decision: an endorsement of a flawed process that desperately needs fixing. The redistricting commission ran over budget, failed to deliver its three draft maps for public input, went dark and reversed its call for public input, relied on outside help to make data publicly available and even had one meeting end in tears. In mid-July 2011, editorial boards were berating the commission. (See the Ventura County Star, the Los Angeles Daily News, the San Diego Union Tribune and the Santa Cruz Sentinel editorials.) Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye was looking into hiring map-drawing consultants.

“The process that the Citizens Redistricting Commission used as a first time effort should not be replicated without significant systemic revision,” Commissioner Mike Ward told me via email. Matt Rexroad, a partner with Meridian Pacific and redistricting expert, offered a few suggestions in a Sacramento Bee opinion piece back in October. Editorial boards and good government groups should set aside their hatred of Republicans and give Rexroad’s reforms a serious look. CalWatchdog has assembled our own list of reforms.

1. Deliver Draft Maps on Schedule as Promised

Problem: The commission promised three draft maps for public input, but failed to deliver anything but the first draft. “Not only did they completely abandon the first draft maps, but they failed to release another complete set of maps until the day prior to the vote,” Rexroad wrote in his second suggestion. The visualizations encouraged the commission to fluctuate back and forth between angry interest groups. When the commission announced it was skipping the second draft maps, Dan Walters described it as taking “the process behind semi-closed doors.” Not so open and transparent, after all.

Solution: Listen to KQED’s John Myers. He first pointed out that the commission confused its legal timeline. “The commission is operating under the belief that the final maps should be available for public inspection for two weeks before being certified on August 15,” he wrote in mid-July. “However, a review of both Proposition 11 and Proposition 20 — the templates for the process — reveals no requirement for that lengthy of a review, other than the public have notice of any meeting at least 14 days in advance.” Two extra weeks could have made the difference between draft maps and visualizations.

2. Adopt an Email Retention Policy to Preserve the Public Record & Ban Private Email Accounts

Problem: It’s never been reported, but Karin McDonald, the mapping consultant for Q2, demanded that commissioners communicate with her about redistricting business via her private email account, not her government email account. Peter Scheer, the executive director of the California First Amendment Coalition, has written extensively about why government agencies shouldn’t be allowed to conduct government business via private email accounts. McDonald’s motives are unclear because the emails aren’t public. The commission never had an explicit policy forbidding such behavior or mandating the retention of private email records.

Solution: Adopt Peter Scheer’s three-point email retention policy. Read it here.

3. Commission Oversight: Swap the State Auditor for the FPPC

Problem: The State Auditor was the wrong state agency to monitor redistricting commissioners for potential conflicts of interests. The State Auditor has minimal understanding of the intricacies of campaign finance laws and is a poor choice to review the backgrounds of the commissioners and their families. A memo from the State Auditor’s office that was provided to CalWatchDog.com by an agency spokeswoman described their background searches as “routine” and “obviously rather brief.” 

Solution: Require the Fair Political Practices Commission, the state agency responsible for administering conflict-of-interest documents, to conduct all campaign finance background checks of redistricting commissioners.

4. Campaign Finance Restrictions: Lower the Disclosure Amount to $100

Problem: A campaign contribution is protected political speech because the donation itself is an expression of support for a candidate. It’s not just what the money can buy. Commissioner Gabino Aguirre’s $100 contribution to Assemblyman Das Williams, D-Santa Barbara, wasn’t going to make or break the Democrat’s campaign. However, it showed a potential conflict of interest. It was evidence that Aguirre liked and supported Williams for state office. But redistricting commissioners were only required to close donations of $250 or more. 

Solution: Lower the redistricting commissioner disclosure threshold to $100 for campaign or political contributions. The $100 threshold will match state campaign finance law.

5. Campaign Finance Restrictions: Add Business Contributions to the Disclosure Requirements

Problem: Within 18 months of her appointment, Commissioner Jeanne Raya’s business made four campaign contributions to a state political action committee. The business contributions were sizeable, totaling $1,000. Former chairman of the Fair Political Practices Commission Dan Schnur said, “The applicant should have listed the contribution: a contribution from a business in which you are the principal is a legitimate indicator of political involvement.” 

Solution: Require commissioners to disclose campaign contributions made on behalf of businesses and organizations in which the applicant serves as a principal officer.

6. Improve Commissioner Disclosure Forms

Problem: State law requires all redistricting commissioners to complete a supplemental application, in which applicants must: “Describe the professional, social, political, volunteer, and community activities in which you have engaged that you believe are relevant to serving as a commissioner, as discussed in Regulation 60847.” This self-disclosure of facts that “you believe are relevant” grants commissioners too much leeway to play innocent later.

Solution: Use the history and public record from this year’s redistricting process to compile a list of relevant organizations. We have an example of the wide range of various community and special interest groups that testified or lobbied the redistricting commission. Compile a list of all organizations and provide a supplemental sheet with specific examples.

7. Sequester Commissioners from Personal Interests, Affiliations and Geographic Bias

Problem: Commissioner Aguirre influenced the commission’s Central Coast maps to favor his political allies at the Central Coast Alliance for a Sustainable Economy. Even if commissioners can set aside personal biases, the commission’s code of ethics requires commissioners to “disclose actual or perceived conflicts of interest to the Commission.” Aguirre wasn’t alone. Other commissioners allowed personal histories with geographic areas to affect their map-drawing decisions. (See Rexroad’s Number 8.)

Solution: Sequester commissioners from mapping decisions from affiliated groups, personal and professional relationships and relevant geographic regions.

8. Hire a Neutral In-Process Reviewer to “Check the Checker”

Problem: In his speech at the August 15 press conference, Commissioner Ward outlined why an in-process reviewer was necessary: “This commission also failed on the openness and transparency front, when it failed to adopt an in-process review, a system to ‘check the checker’ to validate that information was accurate, forthright and correct. In one instance, I found that mapping consultants had incorrectly represented the public’s comments.” The commission almost went forward with an in-process reviewer but, according to John Eastman and Charles Bell, writing on the Flash Report, had to backpedal when “a public outroar ensued.”

Solution: Hire an in-process reviewer to evaluate the commission’s work and guarantee that the reviewer is independent and unaffiliated with commissioners, commission staff or mapping consultants.

9. Ban Partisan Hiring Decision or Require Bipartisan Hiring Practices 

Problem: The first time Republicans’ feathers got ruffled was when the commission hired Q2 as the lead mapping consultant. According to the Sacramento Bee, “Q2 met bidding requirements only after a last-minute change by the commission, which initially demanded experience in redistricting projects involving about 2 million people but dropped the standard to about 300,000.” Add the Rose Institute’s disqualification, and you’ve got at least the appearance of biased staffing decisions. Ironically, Doug Johnson of the Rose Institute was one of the first people to argue that the commission didn’t violate the Voting Rights Act with the Los Angeles County congressional splits. (See his quote in my City Journal piece.) There’s no question that Johnson and the Rose Institute would have provided neutral advice to the commission. The commission should have hired Rose and Q2 to avoid partisan complaints. 

Solution: Don’t amend any “invitations for bid” at the last minute and always hire both a Republican and a Democratic mapping consultants.

10. Honesty: Disclose that Commissioners Know How Incumbents Are Affected 

Problem: Proposition 11 mandates, “The place of residence of any incumbent or political candidate shall not be considered in the creation of a map.” The worst secret of the redistricting commission is that commissioners knew where incumbents lived. Emails from the public referenced how incumbents were affected by the draft maps. The commission’s press office distributed news roundups about all redistricting stories, which included the media’s horse race and campaign analyses. Of course, Aguirre knew where Williams lived because he contributed to his campaign. 

Solution: Come out with the secret. Disclose on the record at the start of the process where all incumbents live. It’s better than hiding or pretending that the commission is ignorant.

(See the related article from yesterday by John Hrabe, “CA GOP ‘Idiots’ Lose State Senate.”)

By WAYNE LUSVARDI

Is Gov. Jerry Brown dangerously inferring that if he does not get his proposed state budget balanced high, urban riots are not only inevitable but permissible?

On April 10, he spoke at the Reagan State Building in downtown Los Angeles using Civil War metaphors for describing the level of political partisanship he is finding over the inability to reach consensus on a state budget.

Gov. Brown told CBS News reporter Dave Bryan:

[T]he country hasn’t been this divided since the Civil War…. We are at a point of civil discord, and I would not minimize the risk to our country and to our state. It is not trivial. I’ve been around a long time.  I’m a student of history.  I’m a student of contemporary politics. We are facing what I would call a ‘regime crisis.’ The legitimacy of our very democratic institutions are in question.

Is Gov. Brown trying to persuade the electorate to vote for his high-balanced state budget, or is he dangerously trying to extort the outcome he wants?

No Mandate for Taxes

Brown and a fawning press continue to portray the Nov. 2, 2010 election, a clean-sweep victory by the Party of Government for all statewide public offices up for election, as a mandate for tax increases.  The fact is that in the same statewide election Brown’s party lost every ballot initiative  that had anything to do with raising taxes. That included Proposition 25, which passed and allowed the legislature to pass a state budget with only a bare majority vote, but only — read the fine print — if taxes are not raised!

Brown continues to pretend that he and his party were granted the “consent of the governed” to raise taxes — when they most definitely were not.   Put in the intellectual terms that Jerry Brown uses, raising taxes was deemed an “illegitimate” option.

It most certainly is a legitimacy crisis for his party’s regime, just as it was for former Gov. Schwarzenegger when he lost his package of reform initiatives in 2005.  But how dare Brown raise the legitimacy issue when his political party has opposed the will of the people again and again with Proposition 187 (immigration reform) and the two same-sex marriage measures, Proposition 22 and Proposition 8? His party also has helped create government agencies with unelected officials far removed from the consent of the governed such, as the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and the Water Resources Control Board.

Tax and Spend Regime Was Declared Over by Voters in Nov. 2010

But how can it be called a “crisis” when the voters spoke loud and clear beforehand that raising taxes was not legit? The electorate already sent a message that the “tax and spend regime” of the past is over.  But Gov. Brown and the media want to spin that it never happened and that rejection of his tax package would spell a “regime crisis.”  Denial is a fictional river in California, not Egypt.

Political scientist Robert A. Dahl came up with an apt metaphor for explaining how legitimacy works in a state such as California with its perpetual droughts.  Dahl described legitimacy as a “reservoir.”  Inasmuch as the water is at a given level, political stability is maintained; if it falls below the required level, political legitimacy is endangered.”

In other words, political legitimacy is not gained by merely getting elected, even in a clean sweep of all offices. In California this is mainly due to the mechanics of gerrymandering that guarantees non-competitive electoral districts.  Elections in such highly gerrymandered districts do not confer the consent of the governed to raise taxes.

Proposition 11, passed by voters in 2008, is supposed to end the gerrymandering by establishing the California Citizens Redistricting Commission to draw non-partisan districts without gerrymandering. But columnist Dan Walters, among others, is skeptical that it will work as advertised.

Political legitimacy can’t be merely gained by highly gerrymandered votes, laws or regulations, the charisma of an articulate leader or even an approving press.  Legitimacy can ultimately only be gained by political “virtue,” a misunderstood concept not having anything to do with personal morality but with doing what is best for the people in the long run even at the expense of one’s popularity.

The U.S. Civil War Was Not Inevitable

With all his talk of Civil War, Brown seems to be implying that the predictable results from a failed budget will be civil war.  As historian Douglas G. Egerton describes in his 2010 book, “Year of Meteors: Stephen Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, and the Election that Brought on the Civil War,” the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 was not inevitable.  The reason that full-scale hostilities broke out was the result of a conspiracy of a relatively few men.

Abraham Lincoln was covertly supported for president by a band of Southern extremist, pro-slavery politicians called the “Fire Eaters” who wanted to trigger the secession of Southern states.  According to Egerton, the Civil War came about not when the Southern states seceded but when the Northern states tried to stop them.

It was small provocations, verbal insults, race baiting, taunts, conspiracies, yellow journalism and other gestures that led up to the Civil War.  Such may be the case of a Civil War metaphor today in California, which may be misinterpreted to mean that without an approved state budget there will be “war.”

Which raises the question: Is Jerry Brown issuing a warning or is he granting tacit approval for a civil war?  To repeat, civil war is not inevitable.  It is something that comes about typically when leaders, and small groups of elites, together with the press, are able to indirectly communicate that violence is a permissible option and may not even be punished.

No less a role is played by the press. As Egerton writes in his book, “Democratic [Party] newspapers angrily placed the failure of conciliation squarely on Lincoln’s party and the President-elect.”

John Brown Failed Because His Violent Means Were Illegitimate

Coincidentally, it was a person name Brown, abolitionist John Brown, who helped incite the Civil War by leading a raid on the Harper’s Ferry arms depot in 1859 in the hope of arming slaves for a slave rebellion.  John Brown believed his cause was legitimate, but failed because the slaves refused to follow him and arm themselves for an uprising.

Not that there couldn’t be urban riots fomented by elites in California today, but I find that Gov. Brown’s use of Civil War rhetoric to be dangerous unless he qualifies that any such actions would be severely punished and that his role is as a reconciler.

State Needs to Carry Out Will of the People

What would be best for California right now would be for its leaders to tone down and out the rhetoric of war, to quit scapegoating Republicans and to declare that in November 2010 the people voted for an end to the “tax and spend” regime.  That’s what elections are for: to replace violent dissension and war.  Thus, the “civil war” over the state budget was already held in November 2010.  That war is over and the Democrats lost, despite gaining every statewide political office on the ballot, and a majority of the seats the gerrymandered Legislature.

Martin L. Gross wrote that “government loses its claim to legitimacy when it fails to fulfill its obligations.” Which means today:

* It is time for Gov. Brown and the legislature to carry out the expressed will of the people about “no more taxes.”

* It is time for the press to quit spinning that the voters want taxes raised.

* It is time for moral leaders to not sanction civil strife.

* It is time to exert the rule of democratic law and not descend into the anarchy of Greece fomented by Leftist groups.

* It is time for the state government to regain legitimacy if we are going to have an economic recovery.

Has Civil War Now Gained Legitimacy?

With Gov. Brown’s unfortunate statement about the plausibility of civil war has given such a war a kind of legitimacy, I asked a prosecutor friend of mine  to comment on Jerry Brown’s use of Civil War rhetoric. My friend replied:

Jerry Brown is nothing more than California’s Obama.  He ran as if he knew the answers, and was ready to make the tough decisions.  In truth, he had no answers except the wrong ones (more taxes), and has no intention of making any tough decisions unless someone puts a figurative gun to his head or a recall election on the ballot.  The Republicans have called his bluff, and now he’s in a pickle.

This new “civil war” rhetoric is like the last gasp of a drowning man.  Brown thinks he can scare people into embracing a totally bankrupt remedy that may provide a few more breaths of air, but has no chance of solving the state’s problems.

I don’t think anyone’s buying his budget proposal for one minute.  He wants to do everything but get realistic about how to solve this mess.  That would take real leadership and real guts.  Neither is his strong suit.