LA Supervisors and Latino Voting Rights

After a long and passionate hearing last night, LA County Supervisors rejected a move to radically redraw their district boundaries by a vote of four to one. Gloria Molina and Mark Ridley-Thomas wanted to create a new, Latino-majority district, by drastically changing districts now held by Zev Yaroslavsky or Don Knabe respectively. Yaroslavsky and Knabe opposed both plans, along with Mike Antonovich and Don Knabe. But four votes were required, and Ridley-Thomas finally joined them to produce a majority for a plan by Knabe, which pretty much maintains the status quo. We hear from Ridley-Thomas, Knabe and others.

(Supervisor Yaroslavsky declined our invitation to participate in this discussion.)