{"id":229,"date":"2019-09-30T09:00:06","date_gmt":"2019-09-30T09:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/california\/press-releases\/california-common-cause-urges-governor-to-end-local-gerrymandering\/"},"modified":"2019-09-30T09:00:06","modified_gmt":"2019-09-30T09:00:06","slug":"california-common-cause-urges-governor-to-end-local-gerrymandering","status":"publish","type":"press","link":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/california\/press\/california-common-cause-urges-governor-to-end-local-gerrymandering\/","title":{"rendered":"California Common Cause Urges Governor to End Local Gerrymandering"},"template":"","class_list":["post-229","press","type-press","status-publish","hentry","press_type-press-release"],"acf":{"details":{"summary":"SB 139 and AB 849 would set fair redistricting criteria, increase public engagement and require large counties to appoint people \u2013 not politicians \u2013 to draw maps ","featured_image":"","press_type":157,"authors":[null,"{\"site_id\":\"1\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":8287}"],"related_issues":false,"related_work":false,"location":3},"sidebar":{"helper_enable_sidebar":false,"helper_media_contact":{"heading":"Media Contact","manually_enter_person":false,"person":null,"name":"","role":"","phone":"","email":""},"helper_links_downloads":{"heading":"Links & Downloads","links":null}},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"content":"LOS ANGELES<\/span> \u2013 California Common Cause is urging Governor <\/span>Gavin <\/span>Newsom to sign two bills that could end gerrymandering of county and city electoral districts and give voters \u2013 not politicians \u2013 more power in our local elections.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nSB 139 requires counties of more than 400,000 residents to create citizen-led redistricting commissions to draw electoral boundaries, instead of allowing supervisors to draw their own districts. AB 849 requires cities and counties to use <\/span>fair redistrict criteria that prioritizes keeping communities and neighborhoods intact and prohibits partisan gerrymandering. The bill also<\/span> increases public outreach <\/span>requirements <\/span>to ensure <\/span>all neighborhoods and communities can have their voices heard <\/span>in the process.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nMany of the 17 counties that would be immediately affected by SB 139 have faced allegations of gerrymandering of various stripes \u2013 whether to protect GOP incumbents in Orange County, help Democrats in Santa Cruz County, disenfranchise Latino voters in San Bernardino County, or entrench incumbents in Solano County. A U.S. District Court ruled in 2018 that Kern County Board of Supervisor district boundaries were drawn illegally, in violation of the U.S. Voting Rights Act, by splitting the Latino community.\r\n\r\nT<\/span>he Common Cause-sponsored legislative package<\/span> build<\/span>s<\/span> on reforms initiated by voters more than a decade ago that gave ordinary citizens the power to draw state legislative and congressional district boundaries and removed politicians and their operatives from the process. The California Citizens Redistricting Commission drew fair maps after the 2010 census that helped break an incumbent monopoly on state legislative and U.S. House districts and is considered a model for the nation.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\n\u201c<\/span>Though California leads the nation in fair maps, gerrymandering is still a problem in our cities and counties<\/span>,\u201d said Rey Lopez-Calderon, executive director of California Common Cause.<\/span> \u201cIn many places, local incumbents use the line-drawing process to disenfranchise growing ethnic and language minority communities, reduce the voting power of minority political parties, and even draw political opponents out of the district they were planning to run in. Taken together, SB 139 and AB 849 will end this discrimination and give the power to local voters to pick their politicians instead of politicians picking their voters.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nSB 139 (Allen)<\/span><\/b><\/a>: <\/span><\/b>People\u2019s <\/span><\/b>Maps Act<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n\r\nThis California Common Cause<\/span> co<\/span>-sponsored bill would require:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\r\n