The Rose Report

As reported by the Los Angeles Times on April 12th, entertainment executive and major Democratic party donor Haim Saban recently donated $2 million to the “Yes on Fair” initiative, a political advocacy group led by Representative Howard Berman that wants to overturn Proposition 11.  Proposition 11 was passed by California voters in 2008 and created [...]

30,275 people applied for the 14 slots on the Citizens Redistricting Commission (CRC).  As the Rose Institute reported earlier, the application deadline was extended from February 12th to February 16th because of the intense interest.  The Citizens Redistricting Commission is entrusted with the task of redrawing California’s Legislative Districts in 2011, and is a result of [...]

In 2008, California voters passed Proposition 11, the Voters FIRST Act, which took control of the redistricting process for the state assembly and senate away from the lawmakers and gave it to an independent commission. Now that commission is being created, and citizens from across the state are applying to be on it.
The State Auditor’s [...]

The process for implementing California’s Proposition 11, the ballot initiative which moved district-drawing process for state legislative districts from legislators to a Citizens Redistricting Commission, is well underway.
The Applicant Review Panel (APR) for the Citizens’ Redistricting Commission–the state auditors who will choose the candidates for the Citizens Redistricting Commission–was announced on November 16th.  The APR was chosen [...]

As Rose Institute Fellow Douglas Johnson recently posted on the Rose Report, the California State Auditor’s office has released the most version of the regulations governing the selection of commissioners for California’s 2011 Independent Redistricting Commission, as established by Proposition 11.
Proposition 11 requires redistricting to be done not by the legislature itself as it had [...]

In a recent report, the Center for Governmental Studies found that the independent commission that would result from Prop 11 would be more ethnically diverse and less partisan than a redistricting committee in the legislature. Generally, the redistricting process would become more fair. The entire article is found on The Wall Street Journal’s Market Watch. [...]

The Eureka Reporter made its voting recommendations, urging readers to vote yes on Prop 11. The Eureka Reporter highlights how Prop 11 would give any qualified citizen the ability to apply to serve on the commission, and how Prop 11 ends the conflict of interest legislators have with drawing their own districts:
“This measure would take [...]

Joann Steinmeier, president of the Arcadia Unified School District board of education, voices support of Proposition 11 in an editorial in the Pasadena Star-News, arguing that the measure has advantages over previous efforts at redistricting reform in California:

“The good news is Proposition 11 is a well thought out and well-written alternative to our current method [...]

The Los Angeles times recently had an article taking a look at the potential arguments for and against Proposition 11. Some of the arguments in favor:
At its simplest, Proposition 11 would remove the Legislature’s conflict of interest in drawing its districts after the 2010 census and each decade thereafter.
But proponents — who include Gov. Arnold [...]

From the San Francisco League of Women Voters’ blog:
“Diaz points to the one initiative on the ballot–Prop 11–which could only have appeared as an initiative. This proposal, strongly supported by the League of Women Voters, changes the method of redrawing electoral districts to reflect population changes. It takes the process out of the hands of [...]