Redistricting Could Impact Piedmont's Representation in State Assembly

The City of Piedmont will find itself in a new State Assembly district should the latest maps recently approved by the California Citizens Redistricting Commission be adopted later this month.

Final preliminary redistricting maps released Friday by the 14-member commission would move Piedmont out of the 16th State Assembly district currently represented by Assemblyman Sandré Swanson (D-Alameda).

The city would join a new district which would also include the cities of Berkeley, Albany, Emeryville, El Cerrito, Richmond, Pinole and Hercules, plus a small portion of Oakland. Much of the area is represented by Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley) in the 14th Assembly District, which stretches west to Pleasant Hill, Lafayette and Moraga.

Currently the city shares a district only with Alameda and 85 percent of Oakland, areas which would be paired with San Leandro instead under the preliminary final plan.

If the plan is approved, Swanson would continue to represent Piedmont until he is termed out in 2012. Skinner will be up for reelection then.

Piedmont would continue to reside in a State Senate district with the cities of Alameda, Albany, Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland and San Pablo, which, along with Dublin, Livermore and parts of Castro Valley and Richmond, make up the 9th State Senate district.

Under the new map, the district would lose the East Bay communities of Dublin, Livermore and Castro Valley and gain all of Richmond plus San Leandro, El Cerrito, El Sobrante, Hercules and Pinole.

The shift would thus push the 9th District deeper north into Contra Costa County.

The 9th District's current representative, Senator Loni Hancock (D-Berkeley) is up for reelection in 2012 and if voted into office for a second four-year term would represent her new district.

In Congress, Piedmont would continue to be grouped into a district which currently houses Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Oakland). Lee represents the 9th Congressional district, which includes not only Piedmont and Oakland but Berkeley, Albany, Emeryville and the unincorporated communities of Castro Valley, Ashland, Cherryland and Fairview.

If the commission adopts the maps at its scheduled Aug. 15 meeting, the district would lose the unincorporated areas but pick up Alameda and San Leandro, which are currently part of the 13th Congressional district.

Lee is also up for reelection in 2012.

Commissioners released first drafts of the new districts in early June, and since then have been busy gathering feedback and making minor changes. The commission will vote by Aug. 15 to give final approval to the drafts released this week.

Why should residents care? As the commission itself states on its website: "How the district boundaries are configured can make the difference between empowering and maximizing the voters’ voices or minimizing and muting those voices."

Having citizens draw electoral districts is a process that's new to California and it represents a large-scale national effort to eliminate gerrymandering.

The commission was spawned by a 2008 voter-approved ballot measure that stripped state legislators of the power to draw their own district boundaries. The commission's tasks were expanded to include the drawing of congressional districts last November.

Redistricting occurs every 10 years using updated population data from the most recent U.S. Census. This time around, the commission says its goal is to create contiguous districts of relatively equal population that minimize city and county divisions, and group towns with similar "communities of interest."

Residents who have opinions on the proposed district boundaries may submit their comments via email to votersfirstact@crc.ca.gov, by mail to the Citizens Redistricting Commission, 901 P St., Suite 154-A, Sacramento, CA 95814 or by FAX to 916-651-5711.

"Visualizations" of the draft maps can be viewed here.