Latinos Offer Own Plan for Redistricting : Politics: Proposal includes state and congressional seats and would create six new minority strongholds.

Calling its plan “non-negotiable,” a leading Latino rights group on Thursday unveiled a proposal for new political boundaries that would create at least six districts in which Latinos could control the outcome of elections for seats in the Legislature and Congress.

The proposal, crafted by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, puts added pressure on lawmakers to enhance minority political clout or risk seeing their redistricting plans challenged in the courts.

There are currently 10 districts in which Latinos, if they vote as a block, have the ability to choose their own representatives in the Assembly, Senate or California’s congressional delegation.

Release of the MALDEF plan comes as the Legislature approaches a Sept. 13 deadline for enacting new boundaries that adjust districts in response to the 1990 census.

The plan, which its authors contended would not harm the interests of other minority groups, would make reelection more difficult for two or three Anglo incumbents in the Assembly and state Senate.

The lines MALDEF and a coalition of other Latino groups proposed for the state Senate are similar to those released Wednesday by Senate leaders. The plan would create a new Latino seat in Los Angeles County and a district with a strong Latino presence in the San Joaquin Valley.

In the Assembly, the coalition said line-drawers should be able to fashion at least seven districts in which Latinos could control the result. Five of those districts would be in Los Angeles County, with the others in San Diego County and the San Joaquin Valley.

In Congress, the plan would create one additional Latino-controlled seat in Los Angeles County and a strong Latino seat in the San Joaquin Valley.

The Assembly, where members have been negotiating behind closed doors for weeks, has yet to make public a proposal. Congressional lines will be drawn after negotiations among members of Congress and the Legislature, which must approve the boundaries if they are to become law.

Assembly aides said Thursday that proposed maps for the Legislature’s lower house and for Congress should be made public by Wednesday. But Democrats who control the Assembly sent an ominous message by pushing through, over Republican opposition, a resolution that reduces to just 24 hours the time the maps must be available to the public before they can be voted on. An earlier agreement had set a 48-hour period for the public to review the proposals.

“This greases the skids for another bipartisan incumbent gerrymander,” said Assemblyman Pat Nolan, a Glendale Republican, referring to the possibility of a plan that protects Democrats and Republicans who hold office while minimizing competition among the parties.

It is just such a possibility that MALDEF and other minority-rights groups are trying to prevent by presenting their own proposed lines. They are pressuring the Legislature to abide by the federal Voting Rights Act, which requires any new maps to enhance the power of minority voters to elect representatives of their choice.

“We call it a non-negotiable map because we believe this is a map which will preserve the Hispanic communities and their voting power,” said Pauline Gee, an attorney with the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation. “Any attempt by the politicians to carve up this proposed map would have the effect of diluting the voting power of Hispanics in California.”

All of this would be done without reducing the number of districts controlled by blacks or unnecessarily dividing Asian-American communities, the map-drawers said.

“We are looking at this from a very practical perspective,” said Arturo Vargas, director of outreach and policy for MALDEF. “We are not being greedy. We want to do what’s realistic. We want to do what’s legally defensible. And we don’t want to harm other communities.”

In a related development Thursday, state Sen. Rose Ann Vuich, a Democrat from Dinuba, announced that she does not intend to seek reelection in 1992. The proposed districts released by Senate leaders Wednesday had shifted the boundaries of her district out of Frenso County and south all the way to the Mojave Desert, making it a Republican-leaning seat.

Vuich, when she was elected to the Senate in 1976, was the first woman to serve in the Legislature’s upper house. She said her own health problems and those of her brother, for whom she cares, prompted her decision. She said the shape of the new district was not a factor.