The Commission is very proud to send the map adopted at last night’s meeting to the City Council for its review. Our work has been informed by Census data, the federal Voting Rights Act, countless hours of public testimony, and core values and guiding principles that commissioners committed to at the start of our work.
We conducted a process that secured the civic participation of over 12,000 Angelenos who submitted both spoken and written testimony, and for the first time in the City’s history drew the map boundaries in full view of the public – not in the back rooms of City Hall. And, we did it while our country was recovering from a global pandemic.
From the outset, the Commission made a commitment to transparency and equity. The assertion that this map concentrates poverty in certain communities is patently false. In the final adoption of the map, the Commission took great care to ensure that traditionally disadvantaged districts included critical economic assets.
It wasn’t our job to protect elected officials, their jobs, or their political futures. We hope the Council conducts its deliberations with the same amount of transparency and commitment to equity that this Commission did.
– Statement on behalf of Fred Ali, chair, Los Angeles City Council Redistricting Commission 2021, https://laccrc2021.org
