The criteria the Redistricting Commission are expected to use in order to redraw district lines are as follows (from the text of Proposition 20):
(1) Districts shall comply with the United States Constitution. Senate Congressional districts shall achieve population equality as nearly as is practicable, and Senatorial, Assembly, and State Board of Equalization districts shall have reasonably equal population with other districts for the same office, except where deviation is required to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act or allowable by law.(2) Districts shall comply with the federal Voting Rights Act (42 U.S.C. Sec. 1971 and following).(3) Districts shall be geographically contiguous.(4) The geographic integrity of any city, county, city and county, local neighborhood, or local community of interest shall be respected in a manner that minimizes their division to the extent possible without violating the requirements of any of the preceding subdivisions. A community of interest is a contiguous population which shares common social and economic interests that should be included within a single district for purposes of its effective and fair representation. Examples of such shared interests are those common to an urban area, a rural area, an industrial area, or an agricultural area, and those common to areas in which the people share similar living standards, use the same transportation facilities, have similar work opportunities, or have access to the same media of communication relevant to the election process. Communities of interest shall not include relationships with political parties, incumbents, or political candidates.(5) To the extent practicable, and where this does not conflict with the criteria above, districts shall be drawn to encourage geographical compactness such that nearby areas of population are not bypassed for more distant population.(6) To the extent practicable, and where this does not conflict with the criteria above, each Senate district shall be comprised of two whole, complete, and adjacent Assembly districts, and each Board of Equalization district shall be comprised of 10 whole, complete, and adjacent Senate districts.
The first two criteria are set in law, and any district lines today--even heavily gerrymandered ones--meet constitutional and Voting Rights Act standards. Similarly, the third criterion, geographical contiguousness, is met even in heavily gerrymandered districts (if only barely, in some cases). The fifth criterion is patently ridiculous, as it encourages drawing district lines by esthetics, which is a nonsensical criterion to determine representation.
Therefore, the first main criterion that is expected to differ from criteria used by the Legislature in previous redistricting efforts is that of keeping "communities of interest" together. But is that really much different than how the Legislature redraws boundaries? Lets take a look at two California Congressional Districts, District 39 (Linda Sanchez, D) and District 50 (Brian Bilbray, R). (For some of this discussion, please refer to www.govtrack.us, which has good-quality expandable district maps that are, unfortunately, not permalinkable.)
Bilbray's District 50 encompasses the relatively wealthy coastal region of Southern California from the village of Carlsbad to just below Solana Beach (where property values are quite high), and continues to central La Jolla (situated on and around mount Soledad), where the wealthy enjoy ocean views, but skips coastal La Jolla with it's university of California at San Diego student population and renters. It continues east from La Jolla through relatively conservative Clairmont Mesa, and up through wealthy Torrey Highlands and Carmel Valley (roughly between the i-5 and I-15 shields on the map below), and up through even wealthier Rancho Santa Fe and 4S Ranch, up into the relatively conservative communities of Rancho Bernardo, Escondido, and San Marcos.
So what is the "community of interest" in this case? Clearly, the District was designed to encompass as many high-earners, upscale professionals and business people as possible. Undoubtedly, the wealthy in La Jolla would feel they have more in common with the same groups of people in Rancho Santa Fe and 4S Ranch than the college students populating the UCSD area and the La Jolla coastline. If one just looks geographically, however, the southernmost section of Bilbray's district would seem naturally to extend to the coast, and to incorporate the UCSD areas.
So "gerrymandering" is not necessarily a bad thing, if you simply look at the interested communities within a District.
District 39 has similarly been accused of being highly gerrymandered. The 39th District is shaped like a horseshoe:
For a description of the 39th District, I'll defer to Larry Andre, "Former nominee Republican 39th Congressional District," who ran against Sanchez in 2010 and posted this public comment on March 3, 2011:
This district just happens prime example of how gerrymandering has hurt our state. The District starts in the west in South Los Angeles and sweeps around in a gigantic horseshoe shape ending in the east in Whittier. The district was obviously drawn to be safe Democrat and it has lived up to expectations, being 50% Democrat, 25% Republican, 25% DTS, and over 60% Hispanic, it was drawn in such a manner that included high Hispanic and high Democrat areas. This is only the beginning of the inequalities of the district. The western portion is primarily blue collar with high school education or lower, working poor to lower middle class, and immigrant, with the majority of the populace being Hispanic and to a smaller degree African American. This portion of the district includes the cities of Lynwood, South Gate and Paramount, The eastern portion of the district[,] a small sliver of North Long Beach, Lakewood, Hawaiian Gardens, Cerritos, Artesia, La Mirada, and 62% of Whittier are middle class to upper middle class, high school education and higher, with a mix of white, Asian, Hispanic, and others, The eastern and western halves of the district have few common bonds that would be required by the new redistricting law.
It's evident that a substantial portion of Andre's missive is sour grapes; the voters of that particular District rejected him. He was obviously unhappy the District comprised 60% Hispanic voters, despite the fact they are an increasingly-important voting bloc in the state. And the way California politics works these days, it would be hard to argue the Hispanic community does not constitute a 'community of interest".
Of course, the voters rejected Andre because they didn't like his politics and his positions on the issues, not because the District was "shaped funny". It's quite likely that had Andre adopted policy positions (and actually believed in those positions) that were more in line with his District's interests, he would have had a shot at winning the election. At its root, therefore, Republicans' interest in getting a Commission to redistrict California is borne from their failure to accept that most of the voters in California don't like them. They don't seem to like the increasing influence of Hispanics in the state, either.
What he, and a lot of people in the state, fail to realize, is that the interests, beliefs, values and outlook on life of a bloc of voters constitutes a "community of interest" every bit as much as do neighborhood, work or commuting patterns. Republicans tend to congregate with Republicans, and Democrats with Democrats, because they tend to think alike. There's a reason Districts are "safe": the majority of people in the District like who is representing them.
However, the more generally-stated reason for handing redistricting duties to the Redistricting Commission is not so much to keep "communities of interest" together, but "to create voting areas with more logical, consistent boundaries – such as including all of a city instead of just the Democratic or Republican areas of it – to promote more competitive races among the parties." (Emphasis added.) This quote from the OC Register, which plies its trade in one of the more consistently Republican areas of Southern California, essentially translates into "we want Congressional Districts that are easier for Republicans to win!" And that in itself is a problem, because the Redistricting Commission is explicitly constrained, by the language of Proposition 20, from considering Party voting patterns in drawing District lines.
In short, "communities of interest" doesn't appear at this time to be a cogent basis on which to redraw District lines, and, at worst, represents a fig leaf covering the more direct desire to artificially attempt to make Congressional races more "competitive".
However, the present system of Legislature-drawn lines likely benefits Republicans more than the CRC's efforts will. Republicans currently represent 19, or about 36%, of the 53 California Congressional Districts. Compared to the percentage of Californians registered as Republicans, 30.8%, California Republicans are arguably over-represented in Congress (however, 35% of likely voters are registered Republican). Republicans also fared particularly badly in 2010 (despite a Republican wave in other parts of the country), failing to win any statewide races. The hope of making California Congressional Districts more competitive for Republicans is, therefore, likely nothing more than a pipe dream.
In fact, one person, using Dave's Redistricting Application, predicts that redistricting will actually reduce the number of Republican California Congressional seats, with only 17 seats being designated as safe GOP, likely GOP, lean GOP or toss-up.
After the Redistricting Commission is done, Republicans may wish the Legislature was still drawing District lines.
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