7 Congressmen Sponsor Bill to Create Federal Court District

While the Orange County legal community awaits this fall’s opening of a U.S. District Court branch in Santa Ana, seven congressmen have joined to sponsor a bill to create a federal court district to serve Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

The three counties are now part of the federal court’s seven-county Central District for California, located in Los Angeles. The Orange County branch would be the first permanent division located elsewhere.

The bill would create a western district that would serve about 4 million residents in the three counties. The central district, one of four federal court districts in California, contains more than 13 million residents.

Rep. William Dannemeyer (R-Fullerton), one of the seven sponsors, said in a press release that the central district’s wide expanse and large caseload--the largest of any district in the country--demon-trates the need for the district to be divided.

The bill is co-sponsored by Reps. Robert Badham (R-Newport Beach), George E. Brown Jr.(D-Riverside), Robert Dornan (R-Garden Grove), Jerry Lewis (R-San Bernardino), Al McCandless (R-Palm Desert) and Ron Packard (R-Carlsbad).