The Magic Single-Member District Unicorn is not happy.

The Magic Single-Member District Unicorn is not happy.

In a vote that is sure to annoy the liberal elitists on the Los Angeles Times editorial board, the Anaheim City Council voted 3-2 to reject placing single-member council districts on June 2014 ballot. Mayor Pro Tem Gail Eastman and Councilmembers Lucille Kring and Kris Murray voted in the majority.

In doing so, the council moved forward with implementing a residency-based district system (yes, OCCORDobots: “single-member” isn’t the only type of district) that preserves at-large voting, and gives voters the opportunity to increase the council to six members.

Also going down in flames was the ex poste facto proposal to impose a Form 700 financial disclosure form filing requirement on members of the temporary, advisory Charter Review Committee. It was a transparently political ploy directed at former Mayor Curt Pringle, who has declined to serve on the CRC. There was no coherent, compelling argument for applying to the CRC, and it died on a 4-1 vote.

I watched much of the meeting online but missed the council discussion on the council res-structuring agenda items. I did see the impressive presentation by demographer Dr. Peter Morrison. You can review his Power Point here – and I really recommend that you do.

The bottom line: more Latinos on the City Council is inevitable. The demographics are inexorable, and even if no change is made to the structure of the City Council, sheer weight of numbers will lead to the election of more Latinos in the not too distant future.

Interestingly, Dr. Morrison’s presentation highlighted the difficulty involved in actually trying to carve out single-member districts with Latino-majorities without resorting to Phil Burton-like gerrymandering.

The resolutions implementing Councilwoman Kris Murray’s June 11 motions to create residency-based districts (but still elected at-large) and ask voters to weigh in on increasing the council to 6 members passed on a 3-2 vote (Mayor Pro Tem Gail Eastman and Councilmembers Lucille Kring and Kris Murray again voting in the majority).

Kris Murray’s presentation (which you can view by clicking here). along with Dr. Morrison, really demonstrated the relative success Latino council candidates have been having and seriously undermined the already specious arguments that it is necessary to carve Anaheim into single-member fiefdoms in order to elect more Latinos (or maybe proponents are more interested in electing the right kind of Latinos).

It was a good night for good governance, and a bad night for the progressive mob (which was largely AWOL).

UPDATE: here’s the Los Angeles Times article on the vote, and it is actually pretty balanced. Kris Murray has a money quote:

“I don’t believe we are six or eight Anaheims; I believe we are one city,” she said. “I don’t represent Anaheim Hills. I represent the city of Anaheim.”

Boom. Exactly. I’ve no doubt that belief — not the resentful victimology of Jose F. Moreno & Co. –represents the thinking of the great majority of Anaheim residents.