City-Mandering

We were disappointed when U.S. District Judge James M. Ideman so readily accepted the Los Angeles City Council reapportionment plan this week. The way council members arrived at that redistricting was so shameless and self-serving that we would have liked to see Ideman reject the plan and insist on something better.

But he satisfied the law. When the federal government filed suit against the city last year, its main allegation was that council members discriminated against Latino voters when they redrew their districts in 1982. Because the city plan meets that key objection, Ideman dismissed the lawsuit--although not without commenting that some of the new districts were oddly shaped.

Under the new districting, the heavily Latino Eastside will continue to have a dominant voice in choosing whoever holds the 14th District seat. But now Latinos living north and west of downtown will also be a major voting bloc in a newly created 1st District, and Latinos in the San Fernando Valley will have more influence in the redrawn districts there.

Unfortunately, these potential gains for the city’s largest minority group were achieved at the expense of other city residents, whose political interests were manipulated and manhandled by council members worried about saving their political hides. It appeared for a time that a new Latino district could be created only by putting incumbents Michael Woo and John Ferraro in the

same district. But when former Councilman Howard Finn suddenly died, Woo and Ferraro pounced on his unprotected San Fernando Valley district like vultures. Against the wishes of area residents, Finn’s district was carved up so both Woo and Ferraro could retain their old districts despite the creation of the Latino district nearby.

That cynical process has understandably angered many Valley residents, and it is likely that the council has not felt the last of their wrath. Councilman Ernani Bernardi, who now represents most of Finn’s old district, plans to organize an initiative campaign to nullify the new redistricting plan. But while that might satisfy residents of the Valley, it does not deal with the problem that helped create this mess in the first place.

At only 15 members, the council is just too small for a city that is growing and changing as rapidly as Los Angeles. We have more than 3 million people now, the majority of them white or black like the majority of the council. But the Latino population is growing dramatically, and the 1990 Census will probably note an increase in the city’s Asian population. Soon these new residents will expect political representation, too. The best way to avert future ethnic political battles over reapportionment is to increase the number of seats on the council and to start the process as soon as possible. Otherwise the city’s next reapportionment struggle could make the bitter infighting of the past summer seem almost tame by comparison.