[EL] equal numbers of VOTERS, rather than residents
David A. Holtzman
David at HoltzmanLaw.com
Thu May 19 01:07:40 PDT 2011
Hello Doug Hess,
Your analysis is very astute.Citizenship, age and socioeconomic status
(SES) are what I'm told produce the disparity in number of registered
voters.And on top of that, Districts 11 and 5 (L.A.'s Westside) are
known for their high rates of political participation, which is most
often explained by reference to their high SES -- which I imagine indeed
correlates with citizenship.
To address the disparity in number of registered voters among city
council districts, and to bring politics closer to the people, so to
speak, we could allow noncitizen residents to register and vote in city
elections.
I heard that idea some time ago from a City Councilmember-turned-City
Council staffer, Mike Hernandez.I looked up his Wikipedia entry tonight
and read, "in his 1st District, [] a majority of residents are routinely
excluded from having a say on matters of common concern because they are
noncitizens who cannot vote and are on the lower rung of an electoral
caste system that leaves a minority in charge."Um, wow.
The City of L.A. has its own elections department, with its own
ballot-tabulating hardware, but uses registration rosters maintained by
the county.In these tough budgetary times, supplementing the rosters
with noncitizen registrations might be dismissed simply as too costly.
Anyway, for your future analyses, or for whatever it's worth, I've
replaced the ballots cast column with some basic demographic info
(color/ethnicity, party preference, sex) on the City Council incumbents.
I find it discomforting that there are so few women on the Council.One
of the two is Janice Hahn, who (as discussed elsewhere on [EL]) may soon
be going to Congress.
COUNCIL DISTRICT 1 63,127 LAT-D-M 10.99
COUNCIL DISTRICT 2 129,783 WHT-D-M 14.09
COUNCIL DISTRICT 3 131,215 WHT-R-M 14.88
COUNCIL DISTRICT 4 126,281 WHT-D-M 16.25
COUNCIL DISTRICT 5 168,634 WHT-D-M 13.83
COUNCIL DISTRICT 6 77,476 LAT-D-M 11.54
COUNCIL DISTRICT 7 78,720 LAT-D-M 10.06
COUNCIL DISTRICT 8 117,346 BLK-D-M 16.44
COUNCIL DISTRICT 9 74,153 BLK-D-F 8.10
COUNCIL DISTRICT 10 99,207 BLK-D-M 14.32
COUNCIL DISTRICT 11 160,170 WHT-D-M 14.30
COUNCIL DISTRICT 12 138,033 WHT-R-M 18.49
COUNCIL DISTRICT 13 83,507 WHT-D-M 11.53
COUNCIL DISTRICT 14 93,107 LAT-D-M 20.00
COUNCIL DISTRICT 15 103,513 WHT-D-F 10.27
- dah
On 5/18/2011 6:28 AM, Doug Hess wrote:
> What really stood out in this table (and a quick analysis seems to
> show this, too), is that the larger the district the higher the
> turnout as a percentage of registrations. I.e., if I did the
> regression correct (percentage turnout in points regressed on an
> indicator that the district is an even district and on the number of
> registrations in 10,000s), the percent turnout of those registered
> increased by roughly 4 points if the district was even (had a council
> race) and it increased by roughly half a point for very 10,000
> registrations.
>
> I wasn't sure why that would be, but if the number of registrations is
> an indicator for number of citizens in a district, then I guess
> registration size is (potentially) a proxy in the model for the
> characteristics of the population in the district (e.g., younger,
> poorer, etc.). Or a lot of things could be happening (ecological
> issues here), but it did stand out.
>
> Number of obs = 15
> F( 2, 12) = 10.36
> Prob> F = 0.0024
> R-squared = 0.6333
> Adj R-squared = 0.5722
>
> Coef. Std. Err. t P>t
> even 3.95 1.11 3.54 0.004
> reg10k .473 .178 2.65 0.021
> constant 6.63 2.07 3.20 0.008
> Dependent variable is percentage turnout: [(ballots/registrations) x100]
>
> -Doug
>
> On Tue, May 17, 2011 at 6:24 PM, David A. Holtzman
> <David at holtzmanlaw.com> wrote:
>> The City of L.A. may be an unusual case where the voters versus population
>> distinction makes a big difference.
>>
>> L.A.'s districts are drawn by population.
>>
>> The following is a table of voter registration, ballots cast, and percent
>> turnout for L.A.'s City Council Districts in the March 8, 2011, election.
>>
>> With regard to turnout, bear in mind that only the even numbered seats were
>> up for election, and that only some Council Districts, in whole or in part,
>> were also voting in school board elections (the school board is elected by a
>> different set of districts, and covers more than the City of L.A.)
>>
>> With regard to registration, please note that I live in CD 11, and my vote
>> appears to be much less potent than that of a voter in CD 1.
>>
>> - dah
>>
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 1 63,127 6,936 10.99
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 2 129,783 18,284 14.09
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 3 131,215 19,523 14.88
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 4 126,281 20,521 16.25
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 5 168,634 23,318 13.83
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 6 77,476 8,944 11.54
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 7 78,720 7,923 10.06
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 8 117,346 19,288 16.44
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 9 74,153 6,004 8.10
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 10 99,207 14,210 14.32
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 11 160,170 22,908 14.30
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 12 138,033 25,523 18.49
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 13 83,507 9,626 11.53
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 14 93,107 18,621 20.00
>> COUNCIL DISTRICT 15 103,513 10,634 10.27
>>
>>
>>
>> p.s. Note also that this is about city council seats, not any of the
>> positions enumerated in the apportionment clause of the 14th amendment,
>> which does include some state positions ("the executive and judicial
>> officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof"). In
>> general, city council elections are not subject to as many federal
>> requirements as federal elections are.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 5/17/2011 6:20 AM, Jon Roland wrote:
>>
>> The 14th Amendment actually dictates that representation be based not on the
>> number of residents, or citizens, but on the number of persons qualified to
>> vote (electors), and "number of voters" could be a short way to refer to
>> that: number of those qualified to vote, not who actually vote. So drawing
>> districts equipopulous for residents rather than for those qualified to vote
>> is actually unconstitutional. We have been drawing districts
>> unconstitutionally for a long time, albeit the differences are probably
>> small in most cases.
>>
>> -- Jon
>> ----------------------------------------------------------
>> Constitution Society http://constitution.org
>> 2900 W Anderson Ln C-200-322 twitter.com/lex_rex
>> Austin, TX 78757 512/299-5001 jon.roland at constitution.org
>> ----------------------------------------------------------
>>
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>> --
>> David A. Holtzman, M.P.H., J.D.
>> david at holtzmanlaw.com
>>
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David A. Holtzman, M.P.H., J.D.
david at holtzmanlaw.com
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