San Francisco elections panel rejects removal of its redistricting appointees
After pressing its three appointees to the city's redistricting task force about how they have approached their job of redrawing the city's 11 supervisorial districts, the San Francisco Elections Commission Friday rejected calls that they remove the trio.
It came less than 24 hours of when the new political map is to be posted ahead of a final vote next week."I think it is quite important to respect the independence of the task force," said Lucy Bernholz, a lesbian who is president of the elections commission.Fellow commissioner Cynthia Dai, a lesbian who served on California's statewide redistricting panel in 2011, said she didn't want to "blow up" the redistricting process by removing the appointees.
She felt the hearing held Friday was necessary, however, to investigate the concerns that had been raised about how the task force members were handling their job."We do have a responsibility as an appointing authority to make sure our appointees are living up to their mandate," said Dai. "I think this hearing was an attempt to ascertain that.
I think we were very respectful toward our appointees."Yet commissioner Charles Jung said the task force members not only had done nothing wrong but also were due an apology for having to defend themselves.
