Transcript of Governor Schwarzenegger Touting Redistricting Reform

KATHAY FENG:
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you so much for coming today. We are all here to celebrate the passage of Proposition 11. Whoo-hoo! (Applause) We were repeatedly told that this was an impossible task, that it couldn't be done, that it had been tried four, five, six times before and how could we dare to take on the political establishment? But we hunkered down and we built a coalition and eventually we made it happen.

And colleagues from around the country are already calling to find out, how did you it? How can we make this reform, reforming redistricting, taking it out of the hands of incumbents and giving it back to the people? How can we make that happen in our state? And what we tell them is that there are three easy factors.

Number one, we did our homework. For those colleagues who are out there, like League of Women Voters and my colleagues at Common Cause and AARP, we really spent a long time working on the policy to make sure that we got it right. Cynthia Bryant, I know you're out there, you made this happen too. We worked with the Legislature, we got the language right, we heard from other states that had this kind of system, we listened to colleagues who do this at the local level and we got the policy as close as possible to balancing all of the interests.

Number two, we built an amazing coalition. I think all of the people who are out in the crowd today are a testament to the fact that this coalition defied all political categories. We had left, right and center, green shirts, the red shirts. Everybody was out in force and that's what made the difference in terms of getting the message out to the California people.

I would like to thank a couple of people who are in the audience today, because I think that they took courageous stands to support Prop 11 when it wasn't popular. First, I'd like to start with Senator Elaine Alquist. Senator, thank you so much for supporting. (Applause) Senator Lois Walk. (Applause) Sacramento County Sheriff John McGinness. (Applause) Aubrey Stone, president of the California Black Chamber of Commerce. (Applause) Jon Coupal, president and CEO of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. (Applause) Councilmember Arne Simonson, city of Antioch. (Applause) Councilmember David Whittum, city of Sunnyvale. (Applause) Vice-Mayor Lena Tam, city of Alameda. (Applause) Lori Soldano, Sacramento Asian Chamber of Commerce. (Applause) John Kabateck and Manny Cosme, National Federation of Independent Business. (Applause) David Casas, mayor pro-tem of City of Los Altos and Santa Clara County City Association. (Applause) Rose Espinoza, city of La Habra, outgoing mayor. (Applause) Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation. (Applause) Ken Cooley, first VP of Rancho Cordova. (Applause) First VP of the League of Cities and Vice-Mayor of the Rancho Cordova city. Teresa Casazza, president of California Taxpayers Association. (Applause) Merced County Sheriff Mark Pazin. (Applause) Sierra County Sheriff John Evans. (Applause) And former Assemblymember Bob Pacheco. (Applause) Leif Wellington Haase, New America Foundation. (Applause) Wayne Quint, CCLEA. (Applause)

As you can tell, this list is long because our coalition was incredibly diverse. I mean, rarely do you get the Republicans on the same page as the ACLU. And bringing together amazing groups that traditionally do not work together to agree on one thing and that is that when it comes to redistricting and it comes to giving a voice back to the people, that we all agreed that we needed to do something to fix the system so that there was no longer a fix in for incumbents but instead voters had a real choice when we go out to cast our ballots. (Applause)

Now it's my honor to recognize the third reason, the third reason why this campaign was successful. And I had to apologize to some of my colleagues around the rest of the country, because I said, "Unfortunately, this isn't something that we can necessarily export so easily."

The third reason why we were able to successfully win this is because we have a governor who never says never and who is famous for the line, "I'll be back." And even though he came to California before in 2005 and said that we were going to try to push for redistricting reform and that wasn't successful, what he said was, I never give up. Time after time, if I have to come back to Californians, refine that idea, get it to a place where it's as good as it can be and come back and ask for the voters' approval, I'll do that. And he did not give up, he didn't say no and finally, when we came to voters in 2008, the voters said yes, yes we want to support Prop 11. So let's give a round of applause to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Applause)

Left to right: AARP California State President Jeannine English, League of Women Voters of California State President Janis R. Hirohama, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, California Conference of Carpenters Director Danny Curtin and Common Cause Director Kathay Feng. Photo by Peter Grigsby, Office of the Governor.

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER:
We'll take this little thing away, this step. That's what Danny DeVito always had when he was out there promoting the movie Twins with me. (Laughter) I had to push it in, kind of in a cool way, with my right foot and then I pushed it away with my left foot. And he was very happy, because he was always as tall as I was. So we're using the same tricks. It's show business, you know? That's what we are doing.

But anyway, I want to just say thank you very much, Kathay. She has been terrific, fighting out there on behalf of Common Cause and she's a great leader. And she was there right from the beginning and I think without that grassroots operation we would not have been able to do it, or Jeannine English, with the AARP, or Janice Hirohama from the League of Women Voters, or Danny Curtin, who is here with us, with all the carpenters out there. I can see with the green shirts. What a great endorsement that was. (Applause)

And as you were saying just earlier, Kathay, it was very clear that this was one of those propositions where Democrats and Republicans came together. No matter what your political affiliation was, if you were to the right or to the left, everyone wants to have efficient and good government and I think this is why we have such a great coalition here.

And so we want to thank also Jon Coupal. I want to thank you also for being such a great leader (Applause) and for coming in there and believing in us and helping us fight that battle on behalf of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. Then Senator Wolk, of course. You know, you have been a jewel. We have been doing a lot of things together. And then Jon Coupal I mentioned already, so I'm going to mention you twice, because maybe you won't attack me when we raise the taxes. (Laughter) And I want to thank law enforcement and all the other people that are out here and that are part of this great, great coalition.

I was just talking about it earlier, of how much this reminds me of the time five years ago when I ran for governor. I came right here to this museum, to this train museum and railroad museum and talked about Hiram Johnson and talked about all the kinds of reforms that we need, political reforms and government reforms that we need in the state of California.

And there was one thing that I specifically mentioned, which was the redistricting reform. Now, let me tell you something. At that time, five years ago, I didn't have the foggiest idea of how difficult it was going to be to pass that initiative. No one warned me. They said, "Oh, just go for it." But sure enough, this proposition, this has lost four times at the ballot in the past, we lost in 2005, so it was really a grind. And God knows how many times it has lost in the Legislature, because they tried it over and over and over again.

But finally on November 4th we were successful, we pushed it across the finish line. And it was because we got such a great coalition of people and organizations together, 2,300 altogether, really extraordinary. And everyone took it seriously.

But there was one thing we had going for ourselves and that is that when there is a crisis there are great opportunities. And there was a crisis, as you all know, because not much got done in the Legislature and in the Capitol. And so we were fighting about the budget and the people watched that fight. The voters watched as we had the latest budget in the state's history and they saw Sacramento paralyzed again and again by the same old fights about taxes versus spending cuts and all of those kinds of things. They saw all those fights get in the way of passing a long-term water plan. They saw how those kinds of fights got in the way on passing comprehensive health care reform. All of those things, the list goes on and on, the people watched that happening.

So, of course, the people got very upset. And so we, with the help of the great coalition that is standing up here and that is sitting out there, if it is the League of Women Voters or if it is Common Cause, or if it's California Forward or the AARP, all those different organizations, law enforcement, everyone came together and we finally pushed this proposition together over the finish line, because we seized that opportunity.

Proposition 11 passed last month because people are fed up with government right now. They are sick and tired of a state government that doesn't perform. So they took this right of drawing the district lines away from the politicians and gave that back, gave that power back to the people of California, which was a huge victory for the people of California. Now we will finally see, we will see elections that are more competitive and we will see elections that reward people more for performance. And legislators will be rewarded for compromising, for negotiating and for coming and doing what is best for the people of California, rather than getting stuck in their ideological corners.

So this is going to be a big move forward. Of course, this is not going to happen before 2010 when we start redistricting and when the people will take this power in their own hands. We only have to look at the current gridlock. If you look at the current gridlock and the partisan bickering now that is going on here in California, California desperately needs more government and political reform, we see that every day, if we're going to remain the Golden State that we always have been.

A famous author once said that in a democracy you get the kind of government that you deserve. Now, think about that for a second. And this is why we are standing right up here together and that's why we are all here together with our reform partners, because our people deserve a government that is better than the one that we have right now. They deserve a government that doesn't get paralyzed every time we are introducing a budget. They deserve a government where people are willing to meet in the middle, where people are willing to compromise and negotiate for the greater good. They deserve a government that solves the problems and makes progress on the difficult issues of the day.

So I know there are some people that think that this state cannot be governed. I know that there are some people that say that this is impossible to handle because it's too divided, that California is too divisive, it's too complex and it ought to be split up, the state. There are all kinds of different ideas people have.

But I disagree with all of that, because we have proven that we can govern this state, that we can fix the broken system, that we can move forward and do the things that need to be done. We did it with Workers' Compensation; that has saved the state of California $25 billion so far. We did it again in 2006 when we came back and made the people approve $42 billion in infrastructure bonds to rebuild for the first time California once again after four decades. And we did it with our landmark Global Warming Law and the list goes on and on and on. So I think great things have been accomplished.

The legislators that we have are very smart. All we have to do is now get them together. Get them together rather than being stuck out there in their ideological corners, bringing them together. And the redistricting will be one part of that, that will get them together. So instead of whining and wringing our hands and talking about everything that we can't do, I will work with our fantastic kind of coalition right here, with our partners, to see what we can do. There are a lot of things that we can do in the future to reform the system, to bring everyone together and we will talk about more of that in the near future.

So this is the important thing. We must keep fighting for our reforms that end the gridlock and make our government more effective and make our government more accountable. We are, without any doubt, the greatest place in the world and I think we can keep it the greatest place in the world. All we have to do is make some tweaks and some reforms. Together we can do it.

So thank you very much for listening and now I would like to bring out Janis Hirohama to say a few words. Thank you very much. Thank you. (Applause)

JANIS HIROHAMA:
I'm feeling a strange kinship with Danny DeVito right now. (Laughter) Thank you, Governor. Well, they said it couldn't be done but we proved them wrong. We had a broad, diverse coalition; business, labor, public safety community, taxpayer groups, seniors, traditional reform groups, civil rights groups, people from all walks of life and from across the political spectrum. We all worked together, we fought the odds and we achieved redistricting reform.

We were bound together by one thing; a determination to reform a redistricting system that was broken, corrupted by self-interest and cronyism and we wanted to finally make it serve the interest of the people of California. That was our powerful driving common thread.

But now the fight isn't over. Having secured this great victory for open, transparent and accountable government, it is now our responsibility to assure that Proposition 11 is implemented well. We need to ensure that the excellent guidelines that Prop 11 sets out are scrupulously followed so that the fair process, transparency and public participation we fought so hard for will be fully realized.

Beyond that, beyond redistricting, Proposition 11 is a model for how a diversity of individuals and groups - over 2,000 in the end for Proposition 11 - can work well together to achieve reform successfully. And as we know, the need for real solutions to the problems that plague our government and our state have never been greater. The League of Women Voters of California is committed not only to successful implementation of Proposition 11 but to continuing to fight for reform with the Governor and the many wonderful partners that we met along the way in the Prop 11 fight, to continue the fight for reform so that the people of California have the fair, open and accountable government that they want and that they deserve.

It is now my pleasure to introduce a key partner in the Prop 11 battle, Danny Curtin, director of the California Conference of Carpenters. (Applause)

DANNY CURTIN:
Somehow I have the same feeling, that I'm in the Danny DeVito role. But that's okay, it's close enough.

I really want to thank the Governor very, very much for the vision he brought to this case, this issue, Prop 11. As you heard several times, redistricting reform was tried several times in the state of California and was a fairly dismal failure. When all the political alliances that are out there are against it, it's very hard to change the system. This coalition is a good example of how it's done but without the leadership of the Governor and the presence that he brings to the campaign and to the issues in general, it just would not have happened. So I just want to make sure - his personal commitment to this was very, very key to making this happen.

I'm very proud of the Carpenters here. This is one union that understands that good politics is the same as good government. You cannot have good politics occasionally if you don't have good government. You may get a favor here or there but bottom line, we need a state where everybody can prosper. If we want to be a Golden State, as we've been in the past, everybody has to feel that it's a fair shake, whether it's in the business community or the workers' community, or wherever, retired people, young people that have to get education. All the programs the Governor mentioned, we've been proud to stand with him on the water program, on the health package that he's tried to work on. We will be there.

The problem is, we now have a government that is in gridlock. And it's not because the legislators are bad people. We have two excellent examples here, fine examples, Senator Alquist and Senator Wolk. That isn't the problem. It's not that we have bad people in government, they're good people, they're smart people and they have strong beliefs and that's the way it should be.

But the problem is the way the system is doesn't allow them to do the one thing that people need to do in politics, which is compromise. Everybody understands that politics is the art of compromise. But when you have districts that are drawn in such a way where you're not allowed to compromise, it really makes solving difficult problems very, very hard, harder than it should be.

I'm going to make a reference to a movie - you should enjoy this, Governor - when we had little kids, my wife and I, Darlis, watched over and over a movie called Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Anybody familiar with that? Okay, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, they had a character in there, Jessica Rabbit, who was the most voluptuous cartoon character you ever want to see in your life. And she was accused of being - well, a bit naughty. And she said, "You know, I can't help it, I'm just drawn that way."

Well, what happens in the system here is the way the districts are drawn, you come from a very conservative district you're going to reflect the values of your district. You really can't compromise very much, because when the districts are all set up by partisan rules so that you have very conservative districts and very liberal districts, if you break from your conservative district you're in jeopardy from the conservatives in your party. You can't find that compromise that may make something happen positive for all Californians.

So the redistricting is going to help a lot of politicians be good government politicians, not just strong believers in their beliefs, which is what they should be. But if you have a district that is drawn without partisan thought, you have a more diverse population. You can't just take one position and say well, that's what my district sent me here to do, because the district has a lot of different points of view. You have young people who have education needs, you have people who have social welfare needs, you have people who don't want their taxes raised. You've got to find out how to make those different issues work in the best interests of all Californians and all of the people in your district.

So the best thing that's happened out of this, the Governor, everybody up here in this coalition and out there knows it, we will have more diverse districts, we will give our elected officials - who are smart people and I must say work extremely hard. They're not over here just running around doing nothing. They are up all night, they are dealing with issues that are very, very complicated - but this will allow them the flexibility to find the common ground that's good for all of us.

So I often say the politicians aren't bad, the districts are just drawn that way. So we've changed that, Governor and I want to thank you and I want to thank this coalition. It's the one thing of many reforms that are going to be needed. It's a very, very tough situation now. All these construction workers here are in jeopardy of losing their livelihoods if we don't get a solid budget. If we don't break this gridlock all of the public works that are going on in the state of California will come to a screeching halt. It's a real serious problem, not just the budget but with the financial difficulties we're in. It has to be solved and we need the art of politics like we've never needed it before. We need compromise to find that common ground that brings us all together.

So, having said all that, it's my pleasure to introduce the president of the AARP, the 'red shirts', Jeannine English. Thank you very much. (Applause)

JEANNINE ENGLISH:
Well, I'm going to try this without the stool, so hopefully you'll see me.

AARP is thrilled to stand together with our coalition partners at the beginning of this new era in California. Today we have reason to celebrate and an opportunity to acknowledge the hard work that brought us here. Over a year ago, people said there is no way they can do this and we did it. And we did it because of all of you.

Let me first say thank you to Governor Schwarzenegger. As Kathay said, we could not have done it without him as our partner, so thank you so much. (Applause) I'd also like to say thank you to Common Cause, the League of Women Voters, the California Association of Peace Officers, the California Coalition of Law Enforcement Associations. They were with us at the press conferences. Those organizations - we had 2,000 organizations and individuals who were there to support us through and really make this happen.

We finally accomplished what they said we couldn't accomplish but sometimes the toughest battles are the ones that are really worth fighting for. And the victory now is sweet but we have to realize that we have more to do. AARP entered this campaign because of our mounting frustrations with the Legislature that was really strangled by the partisanship that we saw over and over again.

We fought hard for the health care reform in 2007. Many of you were there with us at that time and it was a real wakeup call for AARP, our association, to find out that we couldn't get it through, we couldn't get anything through. It became clear that the only way to see progress on critical issues in this state was to change the way our legislators come into power, a power that in an efficient system is only afforded to elected officials by their voters, not their political party.

The journey to reforming the state's redistricting process has been a long one. We were out, our AARP members were out gathering signatures - this wasn't just a paid signature gathering effort, we had volunteers out there gathering signatures from their friends and neighborhoods. Common Cause, the League, did the same. So we really built that grassroots momentum in support from all of you and people from all over the state and that's really why we were successful.

But the journey, as I said, the journey to reforming the state's redistricting process has been a long one but we really need to make good on the promises. It was a decision to launch this comprehensive effort to develop an open, transparent and fair redistricting process that would again give the voters the power to draw those districts. Our hope is that fair and competitive legislative districts will produce those elected officials who are willing to work across party lines but also give the elected officials that are here that would like to work across party lines that opportunity, put that structure in place.

This is a great victory for all Californians and for the 3.4 million members of AARP across the state. It's a tremendous victory; we worked hard and long. But again, we are committed to ensuring that the implementation of Proposition 11 results in that fair, open process and that the citizens commission truly reflects the diverse composition of this state. So we're going to continue to work. We're already starting. I think the State Auditor is putting together a group of people that want to work on building that team and I know all of you will be a part of that.

Thank you to all California members of AARP, particularly our volunteers that attended all the press conferences and events, many of whom are here today. (Applause)

And thank you particularly to Janis Hirohama of League of Women Voters and Kathay Feng of Common Cause, who really were the core of the coalition from the very beginning. I also want to thank the press corps, who followed us around and went to all of our press conferences and really helped us get the word out there and also the editorial boards throughout the state who were with us and supported us and made it clear to voters that were reading their papers that this was really important to the state of California.

And so with that I wish you all happy holidays and thank you so much for joining us today. (Applause)

GOVERNOR:
Thank you very much, everybody. And again, Senator Alquist, I want to say thank you also for coming out very early and helping us so much. This is a great team that I see here, that I always like to work with. And I want to thank again everyone that is here today. I know you all are busy and you all have work to. And to come here today and be part of this celebration, we want to thank you and we appreciate it very much. Thank you and have a good afternoon. Thank you very much. (Applause)