How Redistricting Could Erode One Senator’s Base

State Sen. Ralph C. Dills of Gardena, one of the Legislature’s elder statesmen, describes himself these days as “the sacrificial lamb.”

In the once-a-decade process of redrawing district boundaries, the Senate leadership has “ripped me real good,” the Democratic lawmaker said.

Dills could be the most prominent political victim of an effort to create a new predominantly Latino state Senate seat in Los Angeles County. The plan, unveiled Wednesday, would accomplish that by removing Dills’ Gardena-area political base from the 30th Senate District and adding to it heavily Latino precincts in South Gate, Montebello, Monterey Park and Alhambra.

Dills says the proposed district’s boundaries “look like hell.” But backers of the plan defend it as one of the measures necessary to help the Legislature meet federal requirements for maximizing the political strength of minorities.

Whether the new state Senate political map will be adopted remains in doubt. The plan is still subject to change before it is voted on by lawmakers, who are scheduled to redraw Assembly, Senate and congressional lines before recessing for the year Sept. 13.

In targeting Dills, 81, for possible political extinction, the plan spotlights one of the Legislature’s most colorful politicians.

First elected to the Legislature in 1938, he is known for his loud ties, neatly coiffed silver-blue hair and saxophone-playing at campaign fund raisers. But Dills is also a seasoned political professional who wields a great deal of clout in the Capitol as chairman of the Senate Governmental Organization Committee, which handles liquor, gambling and horse racing legislation.

The proposed new lines did not come as a complete surprise to Dills, who left the Legislature in the 1940s, served as a judge, and then returned to the Senate in 1966.

In March, Dills acknowledged that his district could be wiped out or combined with another one because Los Angeles County’s overall population growth failed to keep pace with increases in the fast-growing Inland Empire, meaning that the county would probably lose representation in the 40-member Senate. At the time, Dills said he might run for Congress if his district was carved up.

In part, reapportionment is driven by population. Each new state Senate district must have a population of 744,000. Dills’ existing district is 41,000 people short of that mark.

More important, the district has large numbers of black and Latino residents, whose voting strength cannot be diluted under federal law. To fully enfranchise these groups, map makers had to split them off from Dills’ Anglo population, according to a legislative aide close to the reapportionment process.

Dills said that the Latino population in his new district would be nearly 68% and that Latinos would constitute about 40% of the district’s voters. The district would become the third Senate seat in the county with a largely Latino population. Sens. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles) and Charles M. Calderon (D-Whittier) now represent districts that are largely Latino. Torres, Calderon and Ruben S. Ayala (D-Chino) are the only Latinos in the Senate.

Registration in the new district would be 62% Democratic, a 4% drop from the existing district, in which Dills last year easily won reelection to a four-year term.

As currently drawn, the district includes Gardena, Carson, Harbor City, Wilmington, North Long Beach, Lynwood, Paramount and part of Compton. Under the Senate proposal, most of Long Beach would go to Sen. Robert G. Beverly (R-Manhattan Beach); Gardena would be taken by Sen. Diane Watson (D-Los Angeles); and Sen. Bill Greene (D-Los Angeles) would get heavily black areas in Carson and the Compton area.

Dills said his new district would include Lynwood, Paramount and a small strip of North Long Beach currently in his district. But the bulk of the district would be unfamiliar territory: South Gate, Huntington Park, Maywood, Bell, Bell Gardens, Monterey Park, Montebello and Alhambra.

Dills said he believes he could capture the seat, even though he recognizes “a good hotshot Hispanic could give me a good run.”

Likewise, Dills maintained that he would have a good chance of winning the Senate seat of Bill Greene under the new reapportionment plan. That’s because Dills now represents nearly half of the territory that would be part of Greene’s 27th Senate District. Dills and others say that Greene, who has suffered health problems, may not seek reelection in 1992.