Legislative maps now final
Thousand Oaks Acorn (CA) - Thursday, September 1, 2011
Michelle Knight ; knight@theacorn.com
The votes are in and Thousand Oaks will remain intact.
A 14-member citizen commission finalized new legislative map boundaries on Aug. 15 for county, state and federal offices, completing the redistricting process that is required every 10 years.
“We’re pleased that our city has been kept whole,” said Mina Layba, the city’s legislative affairs manager. “That means . . . we would hope, that after the 2012 election our representatives will be more local.”
The change puts T.O. in the newly designated 44th Assembly District, 27th State Senate District and 26th U.S. Congressional District. Before the maps were redrawn, T.O. was in the 24th U.S. Congressional District and California’s 37th Assembly and 19th Senate districts.
The new 26th Congressional District includes all of Ventura County except for most of Simi Valley and a small slice of Ventura. The city of Westlake Village is the only area of Los Angeles County in the district.
“I think that’s a good thing,” said Thousand Oaks Councilmember Tom Glancy. “I think it could have been considerably worse had we been split up into L.A. County or something like that.”
The first draft of the legislative maps released by the California Citizens Redistricting Commission in June had T.O. split into two state Senate and two Assembly districts, causing T.O. officials and residents to challenge the boundaries. The final maps released earlier this month before the citizen committee vote did not divide Thousand Oaks.
With the city whole, Layba said, residents are likely to find offices of Assembly and Senate representatives close to home rather than in a larger city, which would probably have been the case if the city had been split. Also, T.O. constituents can talk with one Senate and one Assembly representative rather than two for each state house, as proposed in the first draft.
“Sometimes if you’ve got two representatives . . . (they) can cancel out (each other’s) votes—one can vote for and one can vote against a particular isssue or interest that we have,” Layba said.
Mayor Andy Fox agreed.
“We think they make the most sense for our representation,” Fox said, adding that T.O. has more in common with Ventura County than L.A. County.
Herb Gooch, professor of political science at CLU, said the new boundaries generally encompass more Democrats, giving that party’s candidates a viable shot at offices long held by Republicans.
A pair of Democratic candidates have already thrown their hats into the ring to represent the new 26th Congressional District: Moorpark school board member David Pollock and Westlake Vilresident David Cruz Thayne.
U.S. Rep. Elton Gallegly (RCamarillo) will likely run in the district if he decides to seek a 14th term in Congress.
“(The change) made it more competitive, and I think that’s probably healthy,” Gooch said.
The new boundaries will be in effect for the 2012 elections.
Gooch praised the commission— which was created by voters with the passage of Proposition 11 in 2008—for opening up the redistricting process to public scrutiny.
“It’s really nice to see stuff out in the open instead of done in back rooms. So in that sense I think we’re all winners from it,” Gooch said. “It’s shaken up a few of the incumbents, but I think we want a more competitive system.”
By law, electoral maps must be redrawn every 10 years. With the passage of Prop. 11, the task of drawing district boundaries was taken from the state Legislature and given to citizens in the form of the 14-person redistricting commission. When new census figures were released last year, the commission began working to ensure the maps reflected the population.
Layba, who personally petitioned the commission to keep Thousand Oaks whole, said although T.O. fared well by the new electoral maps, other cities—such as neighboring Simi Valley— weren’t as fortunate.
“At this point, we know that there’s probably some disappointed jurisdictions throughout the state of California that were not able to remain whole,” she said.
Visit the city’s website or www.wedrawthelines.org to view electoral maps.