Council members say new congressional and state senate boundaries could harm Malibu’s cooperation with state and federal government.
By Knowles Adkisson / The Malibu Times
City of Malibu officials expressed concern this week after a draft version of new state and federal congressional districts have Malibu cut off from surrounding cities such as Santa Monica, Hidden Hills and Calabasas.
The draft plan was released Friday by the California Citizens Redistricting Committee, a 14-member board charged with redrawing districts for the U.S. Congress, state Assembly, state Senate and the state Board of Equalization after each 10-year federal census. The redrawn districts, to be finalized in August, would group Malibu in a new state Senate district with such inland cities as Santa Clarita, while the new U.S. Congressional district pairs Malibu with western neighbors Point Hueneme and Oxnard, and separates it from Hidden Hills, Calabasas and Santa Monica.
“It just looks like they took little pieces that didn’t seem to fit into anybody else and made a new district,” Malibu Mayor Pro Tem Laura Rosenthal said of the way small communities like Malibu were placed.
Rosenthal and her colleagues on the city council fear that separating Malibu from cities with similar interests and concerns will make it difficult for Malibu to work with their government representatives on high-priority issues such as public safety, traffic, education and water quality in Santa Monica Bay. Malibu is the lone coastal city in the new state senate district, which also excludes much of the 101 Freeway corridor that connects Malibu with the rest of the area.
“The 101 corridor and PCH are intrinsically linked, and we should have somebody at our state capital that understands those issues and can work on them with their fellow assembly members,” Rosenthal said. “We don’t have transportation issues or water issues with Santa Clarita.”
While the new congressional district includes coastal cities such as Oxnard and Port Hueneme, it separates Malibu from Hidden Hills and Calabasas. Those cities, along with Malibu, Agoura Hills and Westlake Village constitute the Council of Governments (COG), which often work together to address shared concerns such as wildfires and traffic safety on canyon roads.
Malibu will not be joined in either of the two new districts, as of now, by Santa Monica, with which it shares a school district. Rosenthal said that could understandably create logistical problems as well.
In a letter to the state redistricting committee, Malibu Mayor John Sibert wrote that “it would be in Malibu’s best interest to keep the local districts together and unchanged.” Sibert urged the committee to consider Malibu and its neighbors as a “Community of [shared] Interest,” which is defined in the California Constitution as “A contiguous population, which shares common social and economic interests that should be included within a single district for purposes of its effective and fair representation.”
“Our concern in Malibu and in the COG cities is that we may become the $1 chips in a high-stakes game,” Sibert said, referring to the temptation to put Malibu and other small communities in separate districts to satisfy population requirements. “We urge you … to recognize the fact that “Communities of Interest” are often even more important to the smaller communities than they are to larger population areas like the San Fernando Valley.”
The state redistricting committee will conduct a public meeting Thursday night this week in Culver City to gather input on the new districts, which will not be made final until August. Rosenthal said she was going to be attending the meeting to express the city’s concerns. She added that the city council was considering placing an item on an upcoming council agenda to explore ways of getting its message to the committee.
If the district lines were to remain as newly drawn, Rosenthal said, “I think some of the repercussions are going to be a senator and congressman who aren’t able to spend as much time on very important coastal issues, and I think that will affect Malibu.”
Still, Rosenthal said she was optimistic the committee would be open to change. “I think that when we let them know our concerns, and they are very important ones … I think they will [listen].”
The Citizens Redistricting Commission Business Meeting will take place Thursday, June 16, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. at City Hall, Mike Balkman Council Chambers, 9770 Culver Boulevard, First Floor, Culver City, CA 90232