Ricky Gill Runs for Congress in GOP

A – May 20, 2011 – INDIA-WEST
Ricky Gill Runs for Congress in GOP-Targeted District
By RICHARD SPRINGER
India-West Staff Reporter
One of the most intriguing races
for the U.S. Congress in 2012 will
be for California’s District 11 seat,
which currently includes most of
San Joaquin County and parts of
Santa Clara, Contra Costa and
Alameda counties.
The race could be a bellwether
in the Republican Party’s bid next
year to hold or increase their majority in Congress.
The incumbent, three-term
Democratic Congressman Tom
McNerney, a resident of Pleasanton, Calif., faces several challenges.
One is that he has a big target
on his back. The GOP recently
ran early election ads for the 2012
elections. The TV spots, which ran
only in the Sacramento and TriValley areas, criticized McNerney
on the Medicare issue.
The Contra Costa Times provided a text of the ads to McNerney, whose spokeswoman, Sarah
Hersh, responded that the ads
were “one more misleading and
baseless attack from Washington
Republicans who are themselves
currently trying to end Medicare
for seniors and keep tax loopholes
open for huge corporations that
ship American jobs overseas.”
A second factor that will shake
up the district before next year’s
election is redistricting, which
will take place this summer based
Born and raised in Lodi in San Joaquin County, Ricky Gill has announced his candidacy for the 11th Congressional
District seat.
on new 2010 Census data (see
separate story). Pleasanton could
be left outside the newly formed
district.
Now there is a third challenge to
McNerney. It is a new face, Indian
American Republican candidate
Ricky Gill, who announced this
week he is running for Congress
in next June’s primary.
California’s primary next year,
unlike previous elections, will be
an open race with all candidates
running against each other. The
two top finishers, regardless of
party affiliation, advance to the
general election.
Born and raised in Lodi in San
Joaquin County, Gill turned 24 a
few weeks ago, but he is not a
newcomer to politics. In July 2004,
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed him the student
member on the state Board of
Education, making him the youngest member of the administration
and the representative for over six
million public school students.
As commissioner, he voted for
the high school exit exam “as the
right (thing) at that moment,” he
told India-West last week, and
also supported charter schools
as one element in improving education, a key issue for his House
campaign. “Education is the great
equalizer,” he added.
Gill’s business experience includes serving as an intern for the
Sacramento Kings NBA team and
working as a legal counsel for the
Oakland Athletics in the summer
of 2010.
He spent the summer of 2006
working for former U.S. Senate
Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.,
whom Gill calls “a friend.” He
received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University’s
Woodrow Wilson School of Public
and International Affairs. While
attending Princeton, his adviser
for his senior thesis was Professor
Jim Leach, a former GOP member
of Congress from Ohio.
Gill has served as co-chairman
of the Greater Lodi Area Youth
Commission and volunteered as a
mentor at KIPP Bay Area charter
schools. He also was a policy consultant for Educational Testing
Service in Princeton, N.J.
The constitutional age minimum to be elected to the U.S.
Congress is 25, an age Gill will
reach a month before the primary.
His parents, Jasbir and Param Gill,
are gynecologists, farmers, and
grape growers.
Currently attending the Boalt
Law School at U.C.-Berkeley, Gill
told India-West that he is running
for Congress because he thinks it
is about time San Joaquin County
is represented by someone who
lives in the district.
[Cont. on page A4]
A – May 20, 2011 – INDIA-WEST
Citizen Input Sought to Redraw Electoral Districts
By RICHARD SPRINGER
India-West Staff Reporter
SAN LEANDRO, Calif. – California has delegated responsibility
for the controversial redrawing
of the state’s electoral districts
to a new voter-approved Citizens
Redistricting Commission.
Made up of five Democrats,
five Republicans and four independents, the commission, based
on 2010 census data, will revamp
electoral districts for California’s
53 congressional seats, 40 Senate
and 80 Assembly seats, and the
four seats on the state Board of
Equalization.
The task is done every 10 years
and California has, for the first
time, delegated the job to citizens,
as opposed to politicians. State
legislatures redraw districts in
most other states.
Angelo N. Ancheta, a law professor and director of the Katharine
& George Alexander Community
Law Center at the Santa Clara
Angelo N. Ancheta is one of 14
commissioners on the California
Citizens Redistricting Commission.
(Som Sharma photo)
University School of Law, is one
of the 14 commissioners.
A Democrat, he told IndiaWest here recently that he replaced a Democrat who quit the
commission to accept a new
position.
Ancheta, a former lecturer at
Harvard Law School and adjunct
professor at New York University’s law school, said the first draft
maps of new districts are due by
June, the second draft by July and
final maps on or before Aug. 15.
The maps need to be sent to the
California Secretary of State and
also the federal government for
approval, the latter because four
counties, King, Merced, Monterey,
and Yuba, have military bases
and are affected by stipulations
in the federal Voting Rights Act
based on previous discrimination
patterns.
Ancheta told India-West that
a majority of nine votes is needed
for all decisions made by the
commission. The nine votes must
include three Democrats, three
Republicans and three of the
independents. “The voting design
is to push for a consensus,” he
pointed out.
“The main reason to get engaged in the redistricting process
and provide input,” Ancheta said,
“is because it determines who represents you and it can have a profound effect on public policy.”
The commission has staff, redistricting software and consultants
to help make the new maps, and
each commissioner receives about
$300 a day for a full day of work.
The main criteria for the commission in drawing boundaries is
complying with the U.S. Constitution by making them “reasonably
equal” by population. Second is
complying with the federal Voting Rights Act by not denying any
individual’s right to vote on the basis of race or protected language
minority status.
Other criteria include making
districts contiguous, that is, having
all portions attached in some way,
maintaining neighborhoods and
“communities of interest” intact
and drawing districts to be compact, essentially making sure that
population areas aren’t bypassed
for more distant populations.
The community of interest designation could apply, for example,
to the Indian American community in the South Bay, who might feel
that they have shared interests in
a particular community.
So called “nesting” is another
criteria, meaning each Senate
district should try to contain two
“whole, complete, and adjacent”
Assembly districts and each Board
of Equalization district should try
to contain 10 Senate districts.
Thee law also states that districts
should not be drawn with regard
for an incumbent’s or a candidate’s
residence and that they should not
be drawn to discriminate against or
for a particular party, incumbent or
candidate.
Upcoming hearings include
May 21 in Oakland at City Council
Chambers, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza,
2 p.m.-5 p.m.; and May 23 in San
Jose, at Mayfair Community Center, 2039 Kammerer Ave., from 6
p.m.-9 p.m. for which the commission is urging citizen input.
Ricky Gill Runs for Congress in GOP-Targeted District
[Cont. from page A2]
The 11th District currently “is
carved up like a piece of sushi,”
he said. Four state Assembly
members, two state senators and
two members of Congress, he
added, currently represent San
Joaquin County. All live outside
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Gill pointed out that San Joaquin County has “taken a drubbing,” with a high unemployment
rate, falling home prices in the
Stockton-Tracy-Lodi area, and
youths fleeing the county for better jobs elsewhere.
McNerney hasn’t been able to
stem the tide, Gill said, adding, “And
he’s had the job for five years.”
Should the new district exclude
Pleasanton under redistricting,
McNerney could still run and continue to live there or move into the
new district. It could be a tough
reelection battle, however, if areas
where Democrats have the voting
registration edge are left out.
McNerney was a narrow winner
by a razor-thin 47.97 percent to
46.86 percent margin in his reelection in 2010 against Republican
challenger David Harmer. This is
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Ricky Gill may run in a newly shaped district after redistricting.
another reason why the Republican Party is targeting the district
as a turnover seat in 2012.
Gill said he knows he will have
to raise “several million dollars”
to run for a seat in Congress. He
said that over the last 60 days,
after forming an exploratory committee, he has raised more money
than that raised by “81 percent of
the (current) freshman” members
of Congress.
His press secretary, Chris Clark,
interjected at this juncture of the
interview, “We will be competitive
in that realm.”
Concerning the health care bill,
he told India-West he believes
“tort reform is something that is
needed to help control medical
costs…It was not included in the
(Obama) bill.”
Gill favors a “balanced budget
amendment” and would support
giving the president line-item
veto powers. He also wants more
federal incentives to encourage
agricultural exports, an issue that
resonates in the farmland communities in San Joaquin County.
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