Disclosure Shoe on Other Foot Now

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

A new 501(c)(4) – i.e. a “shadow PAC” – is on the block in New Jersey and the criticism has been fast and furious.  I’m referring to One New Jersey, started by a group of Democratic strategists as a counterpoint to similar Republican-sponsored efforts.

The main charge leveled against this group is hypocrisy.  During the past year, Democrats assailed two GOP non-profit groups – Reform Jersey Now which promoted Governor Christie’s agenda and The Center for a Better New Jersey which assisted the Republicans’ legislative redistricting efforts – for not revealing their donor lists.  [Note:  Reform Jersey Now did release its list shortly before it disbanded.]

Taking a page from the opposition, One New Jersey’s founders say they will not release their donor list either.  That sound you now hear from the Democratic side of the aisle is the chirping of crickets.

To their credit, some Democrats, such as Senator Linda Greenstein, are sticking to their guns and calling for this group to be transparent as well.  However, there has been a deafening silence from most of her Democratic colleagues.  As columnist Charlie Stile puts it, “fear of losing” rather than the taint of hypocrisy is “what has them pacing the floor at night.”

I do agree that transparency should be a hallmark of government.  Direct and immediate disclosure can do a lot more to temper the negative effects of money in politics than most laws designed to set limits and restrict funding.  However, I’ll leave the moralizing on the disclosure issue to others.  My reason for writing this column lies more with this group’s public roll out.

In short, I’m a bit surprised by the clumsiness with which this effort was unveiled.

According to its website, the purpose of One New Jersey is to “shine a light on those elected officials who act against the best interests of New Jersey’s residents.”  Seems like a good idea at first glance, but it’s clear they have only one party’s elected officials in their sights.

More importantly, it’s not clear how substantive their critiques will be.  The only “light” shed so far is a press release drawing attention to some bad polling numbers for the governor.  Thanks for blowing the lid off that one!

But the real clunker was how they handled the disclosure issue itself.  First, the group’s founders said that One New Jersey will abide by the law, which does not require transparency – the same argument Democrats took the Republican groups to task for.

They also claimed that One New Jersey needs to keep its donors anonymous for fear of reprisal from the Christie administration.  There may be some truth to that – Trenton politics is getting pretty personal – but I highly doubt that any of the donors to this group are not already known to the world as critics of the governor.

And most incredulously, One New Jersey claims that it doesn’t need to reveal its donors because their motives are pure, unlike the self-serving interests of the donors to those Republican groups.   All I can reply to that is, “Says you!”

Do they really think anyone will buy that?  In fact, it’s exactly that kind of self-righteous smokescreen that gets New Jersey’s media commentators’ blood pumping.  You’re just asking for negative media coverage – and public cynicism – when you try to claim that justification.

The astonishing part of all this is that One New Jersey was started by the principals of well-known Democratic campaign strategy firms, namely White Horse Strategies and the powerhouse Message & Media.  These are supposedly the folks who launched the careers of Bob Menendez , Jim McGreevey and Jon Corzine.  And this is the best opening message they could come up with?  [Of course, two of those three clients eventually crashed and burned, so…]

Wouldn’t it have been better to roll out this group with something like the following statement?

"Our Democratic friends in the legislature have proposed disclosure legislation for these groups, but there is no chance that Republicans will support it or the governor will sign it.  Since the other side continues to use these groups to push their agenda, we’ve decided our only response now is to fight fire with fire.  Ultimately, we hope this effort will prod the GOP to change its mind on disclosure.”

Of course it won’t, but such a statement would have given One New Jersey better political cover. Instead they fell back on the trite – “we’re abiding by the law” – and the perennially unbelievable – “our purpose is noble”.

It’s worth noting that in December of last year, Joshua Henne, one of the masterminds behind One New Jersey, tweeted his endorsement of a Star-Ledger editorial that “Reform Jersey Now must go.”

Then, as now, the rationale for withholding these groups' donor lists rings hollow.  It only serves to reinforce the final sentiment of that editorial:  "The last thing New Jersey needs is another reason to mistrust its political leaders."

Sweeney or Christie: Who’s More at Risk?

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

Here’s the story line so far.*

After successfully corralling enough Democratic legislators to pass pension and benefit reforms, Senate President Steve Sweeney allows the liberal wing of his party to control the budget process in order to score political points off Governor Chris Christie.  The governor won’t be outplayed and exacts revenge by making bigger cuts than he initially proposed without giving Sweeney a heads-up.  Sweeney knows he has to make amends with the liberal wing of his party and launches a staged tirade against the governor.

I buy most of this storyline up until the final scene.  There is no other way to put it.  Steve Sweeney was pissed.

I’m not saying that he is unaware of his precarious political position within his own party.  Just that the expletive-laden rant was genuine.

He was mad about two things.  First, as he states, he feels that the cuts were punitive and landed too harshly on the poor.  Regardless of how you view Christie’s line item veto choices, I take Sweeney at his word that the cuts upset him.

Secondly, he’s mad not only at the governor, but at himself for misjudging the governor’s willingness to play along with the political script that the Democrats had crafted for the budget process.

The verdict on this drama is that Sweeney ended up the big loser in this political game.  I disagree.

Certainly, there is a chance that disgruntled Democrats could oust him as Senate President.  But I think he will remain in his post as long he goes to his fellow legislators with a mea culpa:  he was played by Christie, he was mistaken for assuming Christie would be more judicious in his cuts, etc. etc.

Whether Sweeney stays or not, though, the bigger risk is run by Chris Christie.  His political capital, both in the state and nationally, is built on his reputation for shaking up the system and getting big things done with bi-partisan support.

The risk for Christie lies in two areas.  First, he has given his political opponents a new epithet to use against him: "mean-spirited".  The “bully” attack never really worked.  Few voters who don’t already disapprove of the governor’s policies think of him as a bully.  Among the remainder, bully may actually be a good thing considering what low opinion they have of the Trenton status quo.  However, mean-spirited is another matter entirely.

You can be a bully and still make decisions in the best interests of the state.  Being mean-spirited, on the other hand, means you make decisions based on personal political calculations in spite of what may be good for the state.  Whether or not you agree with Christie’s cuts, this line of attack can have some traction among female independent voters who have been wavering in their support for the governor.  [See here and here for a discussion of these voters.]

The other risk for Christie is where this leaves his erstwhile political allies in the legislative majority.  Steve Sweeney has been the single most important factor in the governor’s legislative success.  He has been the one thing standing between Christie and governmental deadlock.

While the other South Jersey Democrats and their Hudson and Essex coalition partners have supported the governor’s reforms, it is Steve Sweeney who has actually been a vocal advocate of these reforms for years.

If Sweeney is ousted from the leadership, Christie can bank on a complete shutdown of his legislative agenda.  But even if Sweeney stays on, Christie’s future success, particularly with education reform, is no sure bet.

The conciliatory tone of the governor’s office response to Sweeney’s diatribe is not part of a pre-orchestrated political gavotte, as some would have us believe.  It is the realization that Chris Christie needs Steve Sweeney more than Sweeney needs Christie.

While Steve Sweeney firmly believes in the education reforms that sit on his legislative docket, he now has little political or personal incentive to move them forward.  If he doesn’t, the big political loser in this dust-up may ultimately be Chris Christie.

*  The Record’s Charlie Stile lays out the scenario in more detail.

Farewell, Old Friend

In just a few hours, NJN as we know it will go dark. I, for one, will miss it. It played an integral role in developing my awareness of what it means to be a New Jerseyan - and a New Jersey pollster.

My first political memories seem to revolve around television. On a hot summer day in 1974, my little brother and I sat in front of the TV in our grandparents’ Camden row home. I was only 9 years old, but my grandfather said, “You’ll want to remember this. It’s history.” On the screen was President Nixon, announcing his resignation from office.

I became more aware of politics as time passed. I read the local papers, the Philadelphia Bulletin where my father worked on the production side and the Courier-Post. I tracked the 1976 presidential race, followed the headline-making exploits of Philadelphia’s indomitable mayor Frank Rizzo, and was vaguely aware that my local Congressman, Jim Florio, wasn’t particularly enamored with Camden’s mayor Angelo Errichetti, who was later convicted in the Abscam sting.

But, at the age of 12, I still didn’t know much about the governor of New Jersey. In fact, I’m not sure I could have even named Brendan Byrne at the time.

That changed in the spring of 1977. Florio, along with nine other Democrats, decided to challenge the incumbent. I was interested to see how my congressman would do. So on primary night, I turned to the one source that continually reported the vote results – NJN. And I haven’t stopped watching since.

NJN introduced this South Jersey boy to New Jersey. And it wasn’t just the news. I was fascinated by documentaries on New Jersey’s history, natural resources, and culture that you couldn’t find anywhere else. This could be something as monumental as “Ten Crucial Days” – documenting how New Jersey played perhaps the most pivotal role of any state in our country’s eventual independence. Or it could be highlighting the Garden State’s natural wealth, from the Highlands to the Pinelands to their recent show on the Raritan River. Or it could be something as simple as Homeless Tails – the short segment that provided a forum for animal shelters from across the entire state to find homes for their strays.

Those who follow the Monmouth University Poll, know that we focus on understanding the state’s quality of life as much as we track political approval and election races. Perhaps moreso. As a pollster who focuses on New Jersey, I see in stark numbers how our state is divided into camps drawn to the two major cities across our borders. As a state, we need to do everything within our power to overcome our natural tendency to balkanize.

Obviously, NJN alone could never provide the cohesive state identity that New Jersey sorely lacks. But its influence went far beyond the absolute number of viewers for any given broadcast. What was shown on NJN had a multiplier effect in other media.

I found it interesting that no South Jersey Democrat voted in favor of the transfer, while their erstwhile coalition partners from Essex and Hudson counties did. I think those of us who hail from the southern part of the state are more sensitive to this issue of state identity. For many in the north, anything that happens south of Union County is of little relevance.

NJN made sure it covered every part of the state in equal measure – and that policy makers in every part of the state had equal access to its airwaves. If you were asked to do a remote interview for the news broadcast, you had your pick of studios in Trenton, Newark or Pomona. In other words, less than an hour’s drive from any point in the state. [As of right now, it looks like NJTV and its contributing producer will have studios in Fairfield, Paterson, and New York City(!) – the closest of which is a 2 hour drive from Camden and a 3 hour drive from Cape May.]

As I mentioned, my first memory of NJN was watching primary night coverage. I’m proud to say that, 34 years later, I was able to contribute to that coverage on their final election night broadcast. During the years I have appeared on NJN, I’ve come to know a top-notch team of professionals, both in front of and behind the camera, who were committed to telling the story of New Jersey.

I hope its successor, NJTV, fully appreciates the legacy it inherits.

Christie Slipping Among Independents

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

A new player entered New Jersey’s crowded polling market and confirmed the recent decline in Governor Christie’s approval ratings.  The big story of this poll is his possible slippage among independents voters.

The latest poll was conducted for Bloomberg news by Selzer  & Co, a well-respected Iowa polling firm with a pretty solid track record polling their home state’s hard to pin down presidential caucus.

The poll found Christie has an “upside down” job approval rating among all adults – 44% approve to 51% disapprove.  This is in line with the Quinnipiac Poll’s 44% to 47% results earlier this month and the Monmouth University/NJ Press Media Poll’s 47% to 49% result last month.

One of the first things I look for with new polls that differ from other findings is the partisan composition of the sample.  Unfortunately, not every pollster releases this – although any reputable pollster should have no problem including this important information with their poll results.   Fortunately, Selzer did include this data (for both their weighted and unweighted samples no less – kudos to them!). 

Their weighted sample of partisan identifiers (i.e. “In politics as of today, do you consider yourself a D/R/I?”) splits 30% Democrat, 24% Republican and 44% independent.  That 6 point Democratic advantage is a much narrower gap than most other polls show.  My tracking of the party identification question over the past year finds it hovering somewhere between a 12 and 14 point Democratic advantage – similar to the partisan split on the registered voter rolls.  If anything, this latest poll should be more advantageous to the Republican governor.

So why the big dip in Christie’s approvals when compared to Monmouth and Quinnipiac? 

The biggest difference in the three polls is an apparent erosion of support among politically independent residents.  [Note: there is some danger in comparing sub-samples across different polls due to different question wording and weighting techniques, but the results bear watching.]

In Monmouth’s May poll, Christie garnered positive reviews among this important voting bloc by a decent 53% to 41% margin.  In Quinnipiac’s poll a few weeks later, this edge was a much narrower 47% to 44%.  The Selzer poll now shows independents evenly divided on the governor’s job performance – 47% approve to 47% disapprove.

There are some caveats for those concerned only with how this will effect Christie's re-election chances.  These polls sampled all adults or registered voters.  The Selzer poll does include a breakdown for those saying they are very likely to vote in this year's legistaive election.  But since this "likely voter" group includes 62% of all adults – as opposed to a more realistic 20-25% – it doesn't deserve much attention.  At any rate, it's too soon to predict who is likely to vote in 2013 when Christie is up for re-election.

It’s also important to keep in mind that all these polls were conducted before the governor’s pension and benefit victory and a poll next week could produce very different results.  [Although just released, the Selzer poll was actually conducted last week.]

But the bottom line is that Christie’s job approval has been wavering – in spite of Piers Morgan’s claims* to the contrary during his obsequious CNN interview – and independents hold the key.

[*By the way, check out the Star-Ledger’s terrific new PolitifactNJ fact checking site.]

Primary Day Outlook

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

Today is primary day in New Jersey.  Here’s a rundown of the contested seats, including my picks for most intriguing match-up and likeliest upset, plus a non-legislative race worth watching.

Turnout should be about 7% – somewhere between 350,000 and 370,000 voters.  While that may seem low, consider that there is little reason for most voters to show up.  Of the 240 legislative nominations available, only 31 challengers are running against the party organizations’ picks.  This includes just 9 Senate seats and 15 Assembly districts (excluding the Democratic challenger in the 7^th who has withdrawn, but whose name will appear on the ballot).

Here’s my run-down.

Most Watched Primary – District 20 (D)
Democrats for Change, an organization affiliated with the Elizabeth School Board has fielded a full slate of challengers in the Democratic primary, Jerome Dunn for Senate and Tony Monteiro and Carlos Cedeno for Assembly.  Some say Governor Christie is tacitly backing this challenge.  While he may be just a teensy bit ambivalent about Senator Ray Lesniak, he’d be extremely happy to see Assembly Majority Leader and former state Democratic chairman Joe Cryan go down.  The NJEA has targeted Lesniak over his support of school vouchers, but are not going after the Assembly incumbents (Cryan and Annette Quijano). 

One thing that hasn’t been mentioned in this race is the impact of redistricting.  While this district remains solidly Democratic in the new map, the addition of Hillside has increased the black population of this district from 27% to 31% 43% (the Hispanic population went from 43% to 41% 38%).  There are no African-Americans on the incumbent slate, while the Senate challenger is.  The Hillside mayor has endorsed the challengers.  While this race is competitive and well-funded on both sides, I see the incumbents staving off the challenge.

Most Intriguing Matchup – District 33 (D)
Hudson County and political intrigue are synonymous.  Senator Brian Stack has long been a thorn in the side of the Hudson County Democratic Organization.  His alliance with Governor Christie is considered to be one of the main reasons that the Republicans failed to get their legislative map during redistricting (i.e. they insisted on sending Bayonne into a district with Newark in order to protect Stack, even though tie-breaker Alan Rosenthal made it clear that he wouldn’t agree to any district split by a large body of water).

One Assembly seat opened up with redistricting.  Stack and the HCDO agreed to a compromise candidate, Jersey City Police Detective Sean Connors.  This selection was a bit of payback.  Connors had challenged Senator Nick Sacco in the 32^nd district in 2007, expecting Stack would support him in a challenge for the Freeholder board the following year.  Instead, Stack decided to make peace with the HCDO and Connors was left out in the cold.

Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer, another pro-Christie/anti-HCDO Democrat, now feels that she is getting the cold shoulder from the HCDO (and the intrigue is upped by a reported IT security breach at City Hall).  She is supporting her Council colleague, Ravi Bhalla, in a one-man challenge to Connors.  (The other candidate is incumbent Ruben Ramos, another Hobokenite.)

Stack’s comments about this challenge have been lukewarm – he wished Zimmer could support the ticket, but understands her decision – suggesting that he may be okay with either Connors or Bhalla as his running mate in November.  My pick is that Connors wins.

Likeliest Upset – District 27 (R)
One of the more fascinating storylines of this year’s redistricting process was what would happen to former Senate President and Governor Dick Codey.  Early speculation was that both Democrats and Republicans would look to put him in a less friendly district.  In the end, his district picked up a few GOP-leaning towns in Morris County, but remains a comfortable win for him in November.

This explains why Republican Party leaders could not recruit a real heavy hitter to take on Codey.  They settled on Essex Fells Councilman William Sullivan.  However, he has a challenge from Tea Party candidate Bill Eames, who has raised a bit of money.  While the addition of the Morris towns to this district will not hurt Codey much, they do pose a problem for the Republican organization candidate in a primary (Morris does not confer party lines on the ballot).  Moreover, Eames has been endorsed by the North Jersey Tea Party group, who also endorsed the popular Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll in the neighboring 25^th district.  I’m going out on a limb and picking Eames in the upset here.

Bad Blood Award – District 25 (R)
Senator Tony Bucco faces a challenge from Morris Freeholder Director – and Wharton mayor – and public school teacher – William Chegwidden.  Their feud is partly based on Bucco’s decision to back his own son for an open Assembly seat in 2009 over other candidates waiting in the wings.  Chegwidden has taken the slight to an all out challenge.  He will lose (as will John Siercho, who is running independent of Chegwidden for an Assembly seat against incumbents Carroll and the younger Bucco).

Bizzare Resume Award – District 1 (R)
A full slate of challengers is being led by Thomas Greto for Senate, joined by Peter Boyce and Paul Halley for Assembly.  Greto ran for state legislature once before.  But it was in Pennsylvania in 1994.  And his campaign was cut short by his arrest and a jail term for deceptive business practices.  According to reports, Greto also declared bankruptcy in 2008.  He is running on a platform to “get businesses going and growing.” 

Aside from the, er, interesting resume of the senate candidate, this race is the first real test of party discipline for Cape May County GOP Chair Michael Donohue.  [The district includes a large portion of Cumberland County as well as a few Atlantic towns, but is considered mainly a Cape May district.]  Donahue himself ran for Assembly a few times and was unhappy with the party support in those races, so he ran a slate of Freeholder challengers in last year’s primary.  His candidates won and he subsequently took over the reins of the county party. 

Donahue has fielded a decent slate of candidates – former municipal judge David DeWeese for Senate, Cumberland County Freeholder Sam Fiocchi and Stone Harbor Mayor Suzanne Walters for Assembly – although they have yet to raise any significant money.  He is looking for a big win in this primary to cement his leadership.  But since this tends to be one of those politically interesting pockets of New Jersey, it’s not clear how big a win it will be

Other contested races:

District 2 (D) – Perennial candidate Gary Stein (governor, Congress) will lose to party-endorsed Alisa Cooper and Damon Tyner.

District 5 (R) – On the Senate side former Camden city administrator Keith Walker has the line against George Gallenthin, whose business property was recently the subject of an eminent domain attempt.  On the Assembly side, William Levins and Ari Ford have the line against perennial off-the-liner Donna Ward.  The party-endorsed candidates should win easily, but no one really cares since this is Norcross territory come November.

District 7 (R) – Senator Diane Allen faces a familiar challenger from the right, Carole Lokan-Moore.  Allen beat Moore 83% to 17% in the 2003 primary.  Take the over at 60 points this time around.

District 14 (R) – Robbinsville Mayor Dave fried and former Cranbury Mayor Wayne Wittman will see off a challenge from jewelry store owner Bruce MacDonald.

District 16 (R) – There are no challenges here.  But since incumbent Denise Coyle pulled out of the race without setting up a Committee for Vacancies, the party finds itself short a candidate in this GOP stronghold.  They are asking Republican voters to write in Somerset Freeholder Jack Ciattarelli (not an easy thing to do, since I just had to look up the spelling of his last name myself).

District 27 (D) – Former Millburn Councilwoman Ellen Steinberg is running off the line for Assembly.  Millburn used to be in the GOP-lock 21^st district, where Steinberg ran on the line for Senate in 2001 and successfully off the line for Assembly in 2003.  She will not be able to repeat history against incumbents John McKeon and Mila Jasey.

District 28 (D) – Incumbents Cleopatra Tucker and Ralph Caputo (who moved hometowns after redistricting in order to stay in the Assembly) should easily see off a challenge by Michael Frazzano.

District 31 (D) – Senator Sandra Bolden Cunningham will see off restaurateur Bruce Alston

District 32 (D) – Nick Sacco easily defeats 9/11 conspiracist and perennial candidate Jeff Boss for Senate, while mortgage broker Francisco Torres fails in his Assembly challenge.

District 35 (D) – Redistricting opened up two Assembly seats in this Democratic-lock district.  The party nods went to Paterson Councilman Benjie Wimberly and Shavonda Sumter, who ran Jeff Jones successful bid to unseat two-term mayor Joey Torres last year.  Torres brother, Samuel, is hoping to exact some revenge in an off the line challenge.  He won’t.

Districts 34/35/38/40 (R) – I’ve lumped these districts together.  GOP Strong, a Passaic based dissident organization, is running Assembly slates in these four districts along with a Senate candidate in the 38^th.  This feud goes back to 2006, when now-Assemblyman Scott Rumana (R-40) wrested control of the scandal-plagued Passaic County GOP from allies of former chair Peter Murphy.  The grudge continues to this day.  The 38^th race also features a perennial candidate Wojciech Siemaszkiewicz (who, fortunately, is not a write-in).  In all four districts, the party line candidates will win.

Non-Legislative Race to Watch – Gloucester County Freeholder (R)
The Republicans have made some noise recently in Gloucester County, considered to be under the political control of the Camden County/Norcross Democratic machine.  The biggest surprise was Governor Christie’s win here in 2009.  This was followed by a gain of two Freeholder seats in 2010, after what had been a decade of total Democratic control.  However, the county GOP has had some problems with discipline.  Their picks for the 3^rd legislative district in 2009 lost to two Tea Party candidates in the primary.  The party basically disowned one, Lee Lucas, due to extreme views.  The other, Bob Villare, is the organization endorsed candidate this time around.

In this year’s freeholder race, there is a very competitive primary which is a proxy battle for party leadership.  Incumbent Assemblyman Domenick DiCicco has sided with the dissident faction against county chair Bill Fey’s slate.   DiCicco scored a surprise victory in 2009 on Christie’s coattails, but faces an uphill battle to retain his seat due to redistricting.  Could he be positioning himself for a post-legislative position?  And is the Gloucester GOP in resurgence or was 2009/2010 just a blip?  This one bears watching.

Chris Christie’s Female Troubles

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

New Jersey political observers are aware that Governor Christie’s job rating has taken a tumble in the past month. All three pollsters who regularly track his “job approval” found similar declines in public opinion.

Both Monmouth/NJ Press Media and Quinnipiac reported net 11 point drops since February and FDU/Public Mind showed an 8 point drop in the governor’s net job rating since early April and a 17 point drop since January. [Note: “net” rating is calculated as the percent who approve minus the percent who disapprove.]

One common theme in these poll results is that the governor is experiencing a gender gap. Specifically, a majority of men tend to approve of the job he is doing while a majority of women disapprove. This finding is true in all three polls. This is considered especially newsworthy because the issue of funding for family planning services (which the governor vetoed last year) is again on the state’s policy agenda. Observers wonder whether that issue has, or will, hurt the governor given the divergence in public opinion by gender.

I tend to be cautious when reading anything more than partisanship into most gender gap results. We live in a highly charged partisan world. Except for rare occasions, Democratic-leaning voters love Democratic officeholders and hate Republican ones, while GOP voters feel just the opposite.

Women are more likely to think of themselves as Democrats rather than Republicans on political issues. In most polls that I’ve reviewed, both state and national, about 60 to 65 percent of self-identifying Democrats are women while just under half of Republicans and independents are women.

Given this skew, the gender gap in a politician’s rating is often masking general partisan preferences. There will always be some sort of gender gap as a baseline for any partisan politician. Indeed, recent polls are not the first time New Jersey's governor has experienced a gender gap in his own ratings. The issue for Chris Christie is whether this gender gap is moving and in what direction.

Examining the last five Monmouth University/NJ Press Media Polls, going back to April 2010, we found the governor started off his administration with a fairly wide gender gap. He had a net +16 job rating from men but a -22 rating from women. This poll was taken shortly after he unveiled his initial budget.

This gap started to narrow throughout the ensuing year. Christie’s net rating among men remained fairly stable at first before dipping earlier this year, going from +16 in July 2010 and +18 in September 2010 to +10 in February 2011. On the other hand, his standing among women steadily improved to -14 in July, -3 in September, and +1 in February.

All that changed with our May poll. While the governor’s net rating among men decreased just slightly to +8, it dropped considerably among women to -12. That indicates a growth in the governor’s gender gap not only among Democratic women, but among independent women as well – a key swing bloc in New Jersey’s electorate.

So how does the family planning issue figure into all this? It’s difficult to say definitively, but the current state of public opinion suggests that other issues are on the minds of Garden State women than social issues per se.

First of all, Christie’s gender gap was already closing and continued to close after he vetoed the family planning funds last year and participated in a Right to Life rally on the State House steps earlier this year. So, it’s unlikely that his current drop in public opinion among women has much to do with those specific issues.

Furthermore, hot button social issues tend to be important in gubernatorial elections only for challengers or when there is an open seat. Incumbents get judged by the job they do on state-specific issues. As such, I think the most likely cause of Christie’s widening gender gap are pocketbook issues related to education and social services.

Back in February 2011, in the first weeks of the governor’s term, we asked New Jerseyans how upset they would be with Christie if a number of things happened or did not happen on his watch. For items such as “property taxes remain high” and “the amount of political corruption has not changed,” there was no gender gap. Nearly identical numbers of men and women said they would be very upset if Christie did not address these issues.

For two items, though, we did find clear gender gaps. More women (61%) than men (45%) said they would be very upset with the governor if “programs that help the poor are cut.” And we found an even bigger gender gap on education. Significantly more women (71%) than men (51%) said they would be very upset with the governor if “funding for schools is cut.”

Interestingly, that’s exactly what Governor Christie did in his initial budget. And the predicted public reaction to those large cuts in education and social services was reflected in the large gender gap in his job approval right after that budget was announced. However, women started to warm to the governor as he settled into office. That is, until his second budget was unveiled earlier this year.

While the new budget does not exact more cuts on schools, it does not restore the funding slashed last year. And to make matters worse, the pain of the cuts has not been offset by promised property tax relief.

So, while a veto of family planning funds may have some leverage for Democrats among women voters, it’s not necessarily because it is a “female issue.” It is simply part of an overall perception among Garden State women that education and programs for the needy have been cut too much with little to show in the way of benefits to the state as a whole.

It’s a perception that Governor Christie will have to work to change as he looks toward reelection in 2013.

Christie v. Abbott

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

The latest Supreme Court ruling on educational funding presented some interesting options for Chris Christie. He could have defied the court order as overstepping its bounds, as many of his supporters hoped he would. In the end, he took a less controversial way out. Maybe.

From a public opinion point of view, the decision will go largely unnoticed. Part of the reason is that most New Jerseyans pay little attention to the court. Part of it is that, over the past 20 years, we have become used to the idea that certain (i.e. Abbott) school districts receive extra state aid.

My own research into public attitudes toward school funding in New Jersey indicates that the public thinks there is an element of fairness in giving extra resources to those that need it most. Furthermore, urban school districts are only slightly more likely to be perceived as wasteful and inefficient than suburban districts in the state. In other words, all districts are equally wasteful.

The overriding sense of fairness made it difficult, although not impossible, for Governor Christie to defy the court’s ruling. He could have focused on Justice Barry Albin’s concurring, sort of, position. The school funding formula authorized by the Supreme Court just two years ago recognizes that students in need are spread throughout the state and that providing full funding only to the 31 “Abbott” districts actually disadvantages a class of students who do not happen to live in those districts.

The governor could have also taken issue, as Justice Helen Hoens did, with the idea that the Special Master appointed by the court had obtained enough data to determine that less advantaged students “are becoming demonstrably less proficient” purely because of budget cuts. [A critique which, by the way, appeals to this observer’s research inclinations.]

Ultimately, Christie would have had to argue that the court was taking education funding away from suburban districts and undermining the promise of future property tax relief. All of that, however, would have been a heavy lift in the court of public opinion.

He would have had to do it without appearing to attack the court. Why? Most New Jerseyans have a basically positive view of the court. It’s unlike opinion of the legislature, where most of the public concurs with Christie’s “do-nothing” moniker.

The governor made the strategic decision to let the ruling stand. He will have to mollify angered members of his Republican base who hoped he would defy the ruling. But on the whole, it will fly under the radar for most New Jerseyans.

The question is what Christie does next. At his press conference, he made a very conscious effort not to demonize the court. At the same time, he threw the hard work of funding the extra aid on the legislature’s shoulders.

Clearly, the governor and his staff have thought through this scenario. My sense is that they are looking at an end game that involves a re-calibration of the “adequacy” level in the school funding formula which will be based on how well schools perform under the current budget cuts.

He is also tacitly challenging the legislature to send him a millionaire’s tax to fund the added expenditure. He will be able to veto that since revenues are running a surplus equal to the amount in question according to his own Treasury department. And indeed, another option is to accept the Office of Legislative Services’ even rosier revenue projections, which will then enable him to increase property tax relief.

Governor Christie may have played it meek and mild in his original reaction. But this fight is far from over.

Garden State Quality of Life is in Eye of Beholder

This post originally appeared as an op-ed column in the Asbury Park Press, Courier News, Courier-Post, Daily Record, and Home News Tribune.

We all have an opinion whether New Jersey’s quality of life is good or bad. But what exactly does quality of life mean? And how does our home state contribute to it?

New Jersey is not an easy place to pin down. It is a state of great variety in terms of wealth, culture and geography. We pack the 11th largest state population into the 5th smallest land area in the country. Among its own residents, the concept of “New Jersey” may encompass a reality that extends only 10 or 20 miles from one’s home. Beyond that limited radius could be an entirely different view of the Garden State.

Certainly, many observers have attempted to measure “quality of life” by looking at aggregate measures such as income and employment indices, home values, open space preservation, health statistics, and the like. Unfortunately, those indicators tend to mask the diverse experiences of New Jersey’s population. They cannot tell the whole story. That’s why Monmouth University’s Polling Institute undertook a project to find out what drives New Jersey’s quality of life by going right to the source that knows best – the state’s residents.

The Garden State Quality of Life Index survey asked more than 100 questions covering a dozen different aspects of life quality. As expected, we found that quality of life lies in the eye of the beholder. And New Jersey has millions of pairs of eyes with nearly as many perspectives on what contributes to a good life. Among inner city residents, suburban homeowners, Wall Street bankers, Jersey Shore denizens, and Pine Barrens farmers alike, there are significant numbers who love the Garden State, significant numbers who hate it, and significant numbers who are simply indifferent to the state they call home.

We also found, though, that there is such a thing as a Garden State Quality of Life. While life satisfaction has much to do with one’s personal circumstances, the state we live in does play a role in shaping those perceptions. Some may say that perceptions about quality of life are just a byproduct of current economic conditions. Our survey found that was not the case. Using tracking data going back three, and sometimes four, decades we were able to isolate contributing factors to New Jersey’s quality of life.

Obviously, the economy plays a role in how New Jerseyans perceive their home state. But it’s not the defining factor. The high point in the state’s overall rating came in the mid to late 1980s, peaking at an 84 percent positive mark in 1987. At the time, resident also gave positive marks about the economy, with about 6-in-10 saying the state was experiencing a good economic climate. By 1990, only one-third of New Jerseyans said the state was experiencing good economic times. The overall state rating dropped to 68 percent. However, the drop also correlated with growing negative attitudes about the state’s schools, crime, and environmental quality.

The economy had rebounded by 2001, with two-thirds saying the state was in good economic times, and the state rating also increased to 76 percent. We also saw a positive stabilization in school ratings and a lessening in concerns about the environment. Within two years, though, the picture had again changed. In 2003, only 1-in-4 New Jersey residents said the economy was good – a drop of 39 points – but the state rating had only slipped by four points to 72 percent due to other contributing factors remaining stable. By 2007, fewer than 1-in-10 said the economy was good and the state rating bottomed out at 63 percent, where it remained in our most recent poll.

At the same time the economy was sinking, school ratings remained positive, concerns about crime had abated, and environmental worries reached an all-time low. These are all factors that buoyed the overall state rating. But something else was pushing that perception down. Something other than the economy.

According to the survey, the culprit is a declining trust in government. The last time a majority of residents gave good marks to their state government was ten years ago, when 54 percent gave a positive rating and just 22 percent said they had no confidence in Trenton. Those ratings have eroded steadily every year of the past decade, ending at just a 24 percent positive rating for state government with nearly half, 44 percent, expressing no confidence.

We performed an additional analysis in an attempt to identify groups of New Jerseyans in terms of their shared outlook on quality of life. We were able to classify residents into nine different groups or clusters. We found only one cluster who, as a group, feel that New Jersey contributes positively to their own quality of life. They tend to be older residents in the state’s urban areas. We also found only one group who feel that the state is a negative factor in their quality of life. This group tends to be younger urban residents. The remaining seven groups include a mix of opinions on the role the state plays in their personal quality of life.

Among these groups, though, there is one that stands out for the level of disconnect between their own standard of living and the role the state plays in it. These are the state’s top income earners. This racially diverse group reports enjoying the state’s highest standard of living, but few make a connection between their own success and the quality of life provided by their home state.

These top earners’ ties to either their state or their hometown are not particularly strong. A majority of these residents say they would eventually like to leave New Jersey, and they have the means to do it. This is a group that the state can least afford to lose. But we risk losing them based on their perceptions about whether government is working for them.

Not to be lost in all this is the fact that perceptions about the state’s quality of life are still positive on the whole. An index which takes into account evaluations of the state, hometowns, education, crime, and the environment places the current quality of life at +21 on a scale from -100 to +100. Residents recognize that there is a lot that is right with the state at the same time they point to major areas in need of improvement.

The challenge for state policymakers, then, is two-fold: fix the negative aspects of perceptions about New Jersey’s quality of life and help residents understand the connection between their own standard of living and the quality of life that New Jersey provides for them.

The New Face of the Legislature

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

Now that the primary candidate petitions have been filed, we can start to get a good sense of what the New Jersey legislature’s demographics will look like come January. And with few exceptions, the new face of the legislature will look a lot like the old one.

Minority representation was probably the hottest point of contention during the drawing of the new legislative map. Based on candidate filings, the number of minority legislators will definitely increase. Not by as much as the Latino Leadership Alliance and others wanted, but probably by enough to undermine any legal challenge to the map based on the Voting Rights Act.

Currently, New Jersey has one Latina state senator (district 29) and seven Latino members of the General Assembly (districts 5, 20, 29, 32, 35, and two in 33). After the November election, each chamber will see a gain – district 35 where a Latina will move up from the Assembly to the Senate and districts 4 and 36 in the Assembly. The net effect will amount to 10 Latinos in the new legislature compared to eight today.

African-Americans now account for four senators (districts 15, 28, 31, 34) and 11 assembly members (districts 5, 7, 15, 22, 27, 28, 29, 31, 34, 35, 37). The new legislature will see the same number of senators and anywhere from 11 to 14 African-Americans in the lower house (based on potential for gains in districts 2, 7, and 35). This means the African-American community will at the very least maintain the same number of legislators and could perhaps add three more. My best estimate at the current time is a gain of one or two seats.

Asians currently hold one seat in each chamber (district 40 in the Senate and district 17 in the Assembly). That won’t change after the November election.

The interesting thing here is that the increase in racial and ethnic minorities in the New Jersey legislature has little to do with any supposed opportunities created by the map that came out of the redistricting process. In fact, if you analyze the proportion of Hispanics and blacks in each district, you will find very little change from the current map to the new one. In 35 out of 40 districts, the proportion of either Hispanic or black residents changed by no more than three percentage points. And even in the other five districts, there will be little change in representation.

District 34 saw the largest increase in minority population, going from 37% to 45% black, but it is already represented by two African-American legislators. District 27 saw the biggest drop, from 32% to 14% black, but it will still include an African-American in its legislative delegation, at least this year.

The real reason for the increase in minority numbers is not the map itself, but the Democratic Party’s need to mollify some unhappy constituent groups. For instance, the two Assembly pick-ups for Latinos come in districts that have not changed much demographically – the 36th (going from 35% to 37% Hispanic) and the 4th (going from 6% Hispanic to 7% Hispanic).

African-Americans will increase their legislation representation in the 35th, where Assemblywoman Nellie Pou will move up to the Senate to joining Teresa Ruiz as the only Latinas in that chamber. The new district will be represented by one Latina in the Senate and two African-Americans in the Assembly, which is worth noting in the context of the redistricting controversy. The district’s population is actually more Hispanic (48%) than Black (25%).

African-American representation may also increase in other districts without overly large black populations. These include the 7th – where the black population actually dropped by five points to 24% in the new map – and in the 2nd which is 20% black.

And for those concerned about the New Jersey legislature’s gender balance, I expect little or no change. There are currently 10 female Senators and 24 Assemblywomen. After the November election, there will be either 10 or 11 women in the Senate and between 22 and 24 women in the General Assembly. My best estimate at this time is that the total number of female legislators will stay stable at 34.

The Same Old Song

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

"The Democratic map, I believe, was a more conservative, less disruptive map," Alan Rosenthal said tellingly on Sunday in justifying his choice of a new legislative map for New Jersey.

"Less disruptive."

After all the basic federal parameters were met (equal population, contiguity of borders, and retention of current minority-majority districts), minimal disruption was always going to be the main discretionary factor that Dr. Rosenthal would use to guide his decision.

In the end, it led to a map that appears to be even less compact than the current one. A map that increases the number of county-splitting districts (when there are already too many in the current map). A map that effectively shifts one-third of New Jersey's municipalities into new districts. But in terms of political consequences, it’s pretty much same old, same old.

And that’s what Alan Rosenthal wanted. Minimal disruption means keeping incumbents from having to face each other. It’s what Rosenthal referred to as "continuity of representation" in his first public remarks as a commission member (and what I then called the "money card" among his list of priorities).

The 11th member is always going to be guided by his or her own area of expertise.

Princeton professor Donald Stokes – the independent member in 1981 and 1991 – developed his partisan fairness argument. Alan Rosenthal emphasized continuity and stability.

You don’t become the nation’s foremost expert on state legislatures without developing some pretty strong ideas about what makes for a good legislature. For Dr. Rosenthal, continuity of leadership is a desirable attribute. Continuity means you have an experienced group of legislators who really know how to operate the levers of powers. In this view, electoral competitiveness is anathema as it could lead to too much volatility.

Others hold different views of course, but Alan Rosenthal was appointed the 11th member of the legislative reapportionment commission. If you wanted to win, you had to meet his standards.

The Democrats understood this. Guided by the astute counsel of Bill Castner, they made sure to dot every “i” put before them – even when they thought Rosenthal was wrong. [The short-lived Buono/Vitale match-up was likely drawn just to illustrate that one of Rosenthal’s requested changes would lead to unintended consequences for incumbents.]

On the other hand, the Republicans stuck to their guns throughout. You can’t really fault them. As soon as Dr. Rosenthal announced the standards by which he would judge the final map, it was clear there was little, if anything, the Republicans could do to get a map that gave them even a fighting chance. You can understand their reluctance to submit a map that fully met Rosenthal’s standards.

That’s why I’m still left wondering how Alan Rosenthal’s name even made it on the list of potential tie-breakers Republicans submitted to the Chief Justice. If your party needs a major shake-up of the current legislative map, why would you ask for a tie-breaker with a 40 year long paper trail detailing how much he values continuity and stability?

Alan Rosenthal is unquestionably a fair man. He gave each side a fair hearing – but within the confines of his determined standards. When he developed those standards, he probably didn’t realize that they could only lead to one outcome.

Even at the end of the process, he said, “It’s a map, I believe, that gives the minority party a chance at winning control of the legislature.” That claim, though, is simply not supported by the statistical evidence. When you break down the numbers, this map practically guarantees the Democrats a legislative majority for the next 10 years.

To begin with, nearly every incumbent is safe. Focusing just on the Senate, at least 27 of the 40 districts are likely to elect or re-elect legislators by margins that are within 5 percentage points of what the victorious party is generally accustomed. A few districts will draw in a significant number of new towns that have voted for the opposite party, but these are still safe districts. Think in terms of a 15 to 30 point win rather than a 25 to 40 point win. These include districts 15, 16, 20, and 26.

[Click here for a breakdown of the initial partisan vote advantage in each district.]

Perhaps the biggest shift affects former governor and senate president Dick Codey (D-27). He goes from a district where he had a 40 point advantage to one where he starts out with about a 10 point natural partisan edge. Given his personal popularity, though, expect him to do better than that come November.

The map also fortifies Democrats in South Jersey. Districts 5 and 6 will become slightly less Democratic (but still safe) in order to bolster incumbents elsewhere. That allows for Republican leaning towns in Gloucester County – which have been giving the Democrats fits – to be dispersed across districts 3, 4, and 5.

A key objective was to strengthen Fred Madden (D-4). Not only will the 4th be more Democratic in general, but incumbent GOP Assemblyman Domenick DiCicco, who was preparing to take on Madden, saw his hometown moved into Senate President Steve Sweeney’s district.

In other parts of the state, Diane Allen (R-7) has been winning handily in what has been a Democratic district. She’ll be on even safer ground in the reconfigured 7th. That leaves Linda Greenstein in the 14th as the only Senate race that could realistically be competitive. The new towns in her district are fairly evenly divided between the parties. But so is her current district. And she just won that handily in a special election.

On the Assembly side, there is also little to no potential for change. While Democratic Senator Jim Whelan’s position in the 2nd has been strengthened, it’s still likely that the GOP will retain the two Assembly seats there. However, the Republicans will probably lose the seat they hold in the 4th.

There are only four districts where the Republicans may have a shot at picking up an Assembly seat. These are 7, 14, 27, and 38. The Democrats have the numerical advantage in these districts and will win most of these seats by 5 to 8 points. But they are close enough that a solid GOP candidate may claim one here or there.

So, my prediction for how this will play out in November is a 24-16 Democratic win in the Senate and a 46 to 34 edge in the Assembly. Practically the same configuration as it is now.

It’s all there in the map.

The “De Minimis” Map

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

The Legislative Apportionment Commission has decided on a Democratic map. The 11th member, Alan Rosenthal, made it all but official at his first public appearance with the commission last week.

OK, I’m being a tad flippant. Dr. Rosenthal only laid out his standards for judging which map he would settle on. The list of priorities he announced publicly was less detailed than the confidential memo he reportedly distributed to the other commission members. However, if he sticks to the general principles in his public remarks, I do not see any conceivable way that the new legislative map can have fewer than 22 safe Democratic districts.

Here’s why. Rosenthal’s standards allow for very little change to the current map. The first standard is his definition of equal population, which he sets out as no more than a 5% deviation. That means that all district populations should be between 214,300 and 225,300.

The 2001 map had an approximate 7.5% deviation. The competitive map I drew last week had a 7.7% maximum range. Setting the maximum range at 5% severely limits the possibility of drawing more competitive districts. To do this, you would need to peel off some border towns from Republican districts – thus making them smaller than the ideal – and add them to Democratic towns to make the district competitive – and thus larger than the ideal.

Rosenthal’s next three priorities are adhering to the New Jersey Constitution’s provision on municipal splits (although he said nothing about the identical provision regarding counties), contiguity, and compactness – which, barring using an actual mathematical formula, is simply in the eye of the beholder.

The fifth priority on Rosenthal’s list is maintaining communities of interest. This is an acknowledged, but rather amorphous, concept in redistricting. Communities of interest can be defined in myriad ways, including people who have gotten used to voting in the same district. Rosenthal did not detail what he means by this term.

This brings us to the money card in Rosenthal’s standards – continuity of representation. Rosenthal defines this as incumbents facing a familiar electorate. In other words, incumbents should be drawn into districts where the majority of voters are already represented by them. You could also call this the de minimis rule – any change should not be consequential to the current system as a whole. Anyone who has worked with Dr. Rosenthal or read his published works on state legislatures will not be surprised by how much he values this type of continuity.

Lower on Rosenthal’s priority list is competitiveness, which he defines rather weakly as “absolutely no reduction” in the number of currently competitive districts and “perhaps increase [them] a bit.” Considering that most political observers can’t identify more than one competitive district in the current map, this standard is meaningless as stated.

Those who value continuity see competitiveness as akin to volatility. It doesn’t have to be that way. The competitive map I proposed would likely lead to a stable Democratic majority. The only difference is that Democrats would have earn that majority in each election.

Rounding out Rosenthal’s standards are minority opportunity and partisan fairness. The fact that these two factors are at the bottom of the list indicates that Rosenthal has roundly rejected the Republicans’ two main arguments behind their redistricting map.

The minority opportunity argument would require revisiting the 2001 process, which dispersed minority groups across more districts. Recent court rulings on this issue indicate New Jersey is not required to create new minority majority districts, and so Rosenthal is probably on firm legal ground. In fact, I would presume that any 11th member would have been unlikely to support such a “corrective” measure.

The Republican’s other point of contention – partisan fairness – is also rather weak. They argue that the partisan composition of the legislature should reflect the statewide partisan voting pattern of any single election. This assumption is patently inconsistent with our form of government. It may make sense if we lived in a parliamentary system where legislative elections determined who the governor is. But we don’t. Furthermore, our districts are drawn based on equal population, not equal participation. As such, district by district turnout can vary by as much as 50,000 voters in any given election. It just so happens that Republicans tend to represent higher turnout districts and so garner more votes statewide.

Now, I actually attempted to draw a map using Rosenthal’s stated priorities. I did this with an eye toward maximizing Republican gains given the limitations of these standards.

I was able to create 39 districts that ranged from 214,293 to 225,452 residents – just a couple hundred outside the range of Rosenthal’s 5% equal population definition. The remaining district has just over 227,000 residents. The map also maintains the same basic distribution of African-American, Latino and Asian residents as in the current map.

The real key to the map is its emphasis on continuity of representation. As such, only 107 out of 566 municipalities shifted into different districts. That also meant that only 23 of 120 incumbents would have to challenge other incumbents for available slots. In line with maximizing Republican gains in this exercise, individual Democratic legislators would lose out. Six of them would end up facing six Republicans in safe GOP districts. Five Democrats would have no incumbent opponents, but would find themselves in decidedly less friendly districts. Another 11 Democrats would have to compete against each other for seven available seats in Democratic districts. So, a grand total of 10 to 15 Democratic incumbents would be on the hot seat. The remaining 105 incumbent legislators would be completely safe!

This also means that the best the GOP can probably do is to come up with a map that creates 22 safe Democratic districts and 18 safe Republican districts (with an argument that one or two of these districts could be competitive). Perhaps just as importantly, all 120 legislators elected in 2011 will have a de facto 10 year term (barring death or scandal, of course)! So the map that emerges from these stated standards is de minimus indeed.

From the start of the process, the Republicans tried to sell the line that they were prepared for redistricting. Not exactly – the two parties just organized themselves differently. The Democrats were better prepared to negotiate with whomever became the 11th member, while the Republicans spent their resources girding for a legal battle. The fact they even put Alan Rosenthal on their list of potential nominees, knowing his long held preference for continuity, is a pretty good indication they were looking past the mediation process to the courts. And since Rosenthal’s standards are well-grounded in legal precedent, they’ll likely lose there as well.

A Competitive Map

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

What makes a legislative map competitive? Definitions vary, but in my view it includes the following characteristics: either party has a chance of winning a majority and the number of districts that could conceivably change hands in each election is maximized. This is not to say that legislative control would, or even should, change hands every two years – just that the possibility exists. Such a map would keep both parties on their toes, increase media coverage of legislative elections, and hopefully lead to greater voter participation.

I define legislative competitiveness rather simply as the raw vote difference between the Democratic and Republican candidates for legislature. For the map I propose here, I utilized a two-cycle (2009 and 2007) average in order to include both Assembly and Senate races as well as turnout in gubernatorial and off-year elections.

This is a fairly straightforward metric. I purposely didn’t include results for governor or federal offices as the vote choice dynamic is different. Indeed, the 2009 election witnessed a decent amount of ticket splitting between Governor and Assembly. Since my objective is to heighten legislative competitiveness, it makes sense to rely on legislative results.

This approach is not without limitations. It does not take into account incumbency. Some current districts may appear to be more competitive because a particular incumbent is able to overcome voters’ partisan preferences (LD14 and LD7 come to mind).

Another limitation is that past voting patterns can mask depressed turnout among one party’s voters when the other party “owns” that district. One potential adjustment to this competitiveness metric would be to merge vote data with partisan registration in each town. However, I’m inclined to think that it would not change the decisions behind the map proposed here.

Basically, I defined district competitiveness in the following way: solidly safe partisan districts have a two-cycle victory margin of 10,000 votes or more; likely safe partisan districts average 2,500 to 10,000 vote margins; leaning partisan districts average between 1,000 and 2,500 vote victories; and competitive districts have average victory margins under 1,000 votes.

In the current 2001 map, 26 districts are solidly safe bets (11 Democrat and 15 Republican) and another 13 have very likely partisan outcomes (12 Democrat and 1 Republican). There are no leaning districts and only one competitive district, which is very nearly Leaning Democrat.

I used past legislative voting behavior (disaggregated to the municipal level) to assign hypothetical margins for the districts in the proposed “competitive” map. Based on this metric, the proposed map has only 17 solid districts (7 D and 10 R) and 10 likely districts (8 D and 2 R), with another 2 leaning Democratic.

That leaves 11 districts with the potential to be truly competitive. (On the map, they are numbered 1, 6, 8, 14, 21, 22, 27, 34, 37, 39, and 40).

[Click the following links for: (1) graphic version of the proposed map, (2) list of municipalities in each district, (3) description of district characteristics in the proposed map; and (4) description of district characteristics in the current map.]

For the record, the districts in this proposed map are contiguous and meet the federal equal population guidelines. The largest district has 228,224 (LD36) residents and the smallest has 211,281 (LD38). The difference between these two is 7.7% of the ideal district size of 219,797 – below the 10% federal limit and similar to the 2001 map when it was first drawn. As to compactness, that is in the eye of the beholder – or the judge who will ultimately review the lawsuit that arises from any map. But it certainly doesn’t look any more contorted than the current map, and in some areas may even be an improvement.

Now, on to the consequences of this map. In order to draw more competitive districts, smaller districts skew Republican while the larger ones tend to be Democratic or competitive. There is a pretty even partisan distribution among districts with 216,000 to 223,000 residents.

These skews are unavoidable when drawing a competitive map in a state where Democrats hold a 33% to 20% partisan voter registration advantage. (The remaining voters are unaffiliated.) That also means Republicans are at a disadvantage in terms of winning control of the legislature, even with a competitive map.

The GOP needs to win nine of the 13 competitive or leaning districts in order to claim a majority in either chamber. Democrats on the other hand, only need to hold on to their two leaning districts and take just four competitive districts to retain legislative control.

Given the state’s voting trends in all elections, it is probably the best Republicans can hope for and fair to both parties. It may also be the fairest map for the state’s more than two million unaffiliated voters, who would have a real stake in the outcomes of one-quarter to one-third of the state’s legislative races.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Other notes on the map.

I did not use minority representation as a factor in drawing this map, but I am aware of the consequences.

The proposed map retains one Hispanic majority district. The number of districts with a 40% to 49% Hispanic population would increase from three to four, while the number between 30% and 39% Hispanic would decrease from three to two. A total of 13 districts would have a Hispanic population of 20% or greater, which is identical to the number in the current map.

Black representation would shift in a few areas in the proposed map. There would continue to be one African-American majority district (LD28), but with a larger majority than it currently has. This can be ameliorated by drawing the Newark dividing line between districts 28 and 29 a little more creatively than I did. LD20, centered on Elizabeth, would also see an increase in black population, while the redrawn districts 5, 7, 17, 22, 31, and 35 would have similar proportions of black residents as in the current map. The Trenton district (LD14 in the proposed map) would also maintain similar black representation. However, the need to pair Democratic towns with Republican towns to make more competitive districts would totally change the face of two districts – 27 and 34.

The number of districts with an Asian population over 20% would decrease by one, to four in the proposed map.

Strange bedfellows. There could be some intriguing match-ups brought about by this new map. From south to north:

Republican Assemblyman Domenick DeCicco has all but announced his candidacy for Senate. But rather than take on Fred Madden in the 4th, the proposed map has him facing off against Jeff Van Drew in a very competitive LD1. Madden ends up sharing LD4 with fellow Democrat Senate President Steve Sweeney. Madden has been rumored to be considering retirement, so this primary match-up may not be a deal-breaker.

The newly competitive LD6 pits incumbents Jim Beach (D) and Dawn Addiego (R) for the Senate seat and Budget Committee chairman Lou Greenwald (D) and Scott Rudder (R) for the Assembly. This means that competitive district LD8 has only two incumbents for the six available seats – Democrat Pamela Lampitt and Republican Patrick Delany.

District 13 may be a hard sell for Republicans, as it includes two high-profile Senate incumbents – Joe Kyrillos and Jen Beck. However, since districts 11, 12 and 13 are all GOP strongholds, a few municipality swaps can ensconce the two in separate districts without affecting the overall competitiveness of the map.

An even more competitive LD14, which includes Trenton and parts of Burlington County, would involve a showdown between Joe Malone on the Republican side and Wayne DeAngelo and Dan Benson for the Democrats. With no Senate incumbents here, the bigger question is who would try to move into the upper chamber. This also means that Shirley Turner and newly-minted Senator Linda Greenstein would have to draw straws in LD15.

LD40, which has been relocated to Middlesex County in the proposed map and should be quite competitive, has only two incumbents – state Democratic chairman John Wisniewski and county Republican chairman Sam Thompson.

Democrat leaning LD18 presents what may be marquee match-ups of this map. It pits Senate Majority Leader Barbara Buono against Minority Leader Tom Kean. The undercard would include Peter Barnes (D), Linda Stender (D), and Jon Bramnick (R).

One also wonders whether the Union or Middlesex Democratic organizations would win out in the proposed LD19, which would be home to both Joe Vitale and Nick Scutari.

LD21, which is now a toss-up district, has only two incumbents – Assembly Majority Leader Joe Cryan (D) and Nancy Munoz (R). LD22 is also a competitive district and includes Democratic incumbents from three different districts, Senator Bob Smith and Assemblymen Patrick Diegnan and Jerry Green.

The proposed LD25 is teeming with Republican incumbents. Tony Bucco and Joe Pennacchio on the Senate side, and Minority Leader Alex DeCroce, Jay Webber, and Anthony Bucco (the younger) in the Assembly.

LD26 has only two incumbents – John Girgenti and Nellie Pou, who are transplants from the current 35th. The only problem for these two Democrats is they would find themselves in a heavily Republican district.

LD27 would become a competitive, even slightly Republican, district defended by former Governor and Senate President Dick Codey. The Assembly face-off could include John McKeon (D) and Michael Patrick Carroll (R), unless the latter’s judicial nomination is confirmed.

In the Newark districts, Ron Rice (LD28) and Teresa Ruiz (LD29) would still be in pole position for the two Senate seats. However, Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver and Mila Jasey would find themselves in LD28 while Ralph Caputo and Albert Coutinho would land together in LD29. The big problem for Essex Democrats (as well as those concerned with the number of female African-American legislators) is that Cleopatra Tucker and Grace Spencer would also share these districts (either 28 or 29 depending on how the Newark dividing line is drawn).

LD34 would be a competitive district pitting Nia Gill (D) against Kevin O’Toole (R) for the Senate seat, and Tom Giblin (D) and Kevin Ryan (D) against Scott Rumana (R) for the Assembly.

LD37 would also be competitive. Loretta Weinberg (D) is the lone Senate incumbent, while Connie Wagner (D) would battle it out with Bob Schroeder (R) and David Russo (R) for the two Assembly seats.

The far northeast corner of the state (LD39), should also be competitive in the proposed map. Gerry Cardinale (R) is the lone Senate incumbent, while the Democratic trio of Gordon Johnson, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Joan Voss would have to be whittled down to two for a face-off against Charlotte Vandervalk and a Republican to be named later.

Finally, the major shifts in these northern districts leaves two Democratic districts with only one incumbent each – Assemblyman Gary Schaer in LD36 and Senator Paul Sarlo in LD38.

A "Constitutional" Map

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

Now the work begins. With the appointment of Alan Rosenthal as the 11th member of the New Jersey Apportionment Commission, the work on drawing up a new legislative map commences in earnest.

A number of interested parties have already weighed in at public hearings, asking for a map that would bolster their group’s representation in the legislature. However, I have yet to see draft maps that cover two particular takes on the redistricting process – the constitutional guideline approach and the competitive election approach.

This column examines one possible “constitutional” map. (I’ll tackle a competitive map in a few days.) There are many ways to define a constitutional map. For my purposes, I looked at a few key provisions.

First and foremost are the federal guidelines for legislative districts: equal population (with no more than a 10% variance between the largest and smallest district), contiguous, and compact. The map must also conform to certain provisions of the Voting Rights Act.

The New Jersey Constitution also provides guidelines. Legislative districts must be “as nearly compact and equal in the number of their inhabitants as possible,” and “no county or municipality shall be divided among a number of Assembly districts larger than one plus the whole number obtained by dividing the number of inhabitants in the county or municipality by one-fortieth of the total number of inhabitants of the State.”

In other words, to determine the maximum number of districts that a town or county should have, divide the town or county’s population by 219,797 (one-fortieth of 8,791,894) and round up. For example, Bergen County’s population of 905,116 yields five allowable districts (i.e. 4.1 rounded up to 5).

The municipal/county split provision can be disregarded if it is necessary to meet other federal and state constitutional mandates (i.e. population equality, contiguity, compactness). However, the legislative map drawn up in 2001 appears to have violated this provision more than was statistically necessary. In addition to splitting Newark and Jersey into three districts, 15 of 21 counties have more district “splits” than the formula allows.

My objective in drawing this map was simply to see whether it is possible to draw a map that strictly adheres to the state constitution. Bottom line: it’s not possible. But you can come close. I was able to reduce the number of counties with over-splits to seven – and only one of those counties included more than one “extra” district (for a total of 8 county over-splits, compared to 24 in the current map).

[Click for the following: a list of municipalities in each district, the district characteristics, and the 2001 map characteristics.]

I purposely drew this map totally blind to a number of other important concerns that the commission may take into account, such as include minority group representation, current party control of districts, partisan voting patterns, and incumbent hometowns. That doesn’t mean I am unaware of the consequences that such a map would bring. I’ll discuss those below, but first the map itself.

This so-called constitutional map (larger version linked here) meets standards of contiguity and is relatively compact. [Note: The map is not the most compact possible, but “compactness” has been very broadly defined by the courts.] It also meets guidelines for population equality. The largest district, LD15, has 231,723 people, while the smallest, LD12, has 210,245. The difference between the two (21,478) is just under the 10% federal limit – 9.8%, to be exact.

Reducing the number of districts in Newark and Jersey City from three to two was easier in the former city than the latter. Because of the size and layout of the Hudson County municipalities, the existing majority-minority district shifted from 33 to 32. However, this change is somewhat semantic, since the West New York and Guttenberg moved from 33 to 32 as well.

The need to keep small (i.e. below 220,000 population) counties whole shifted some Cumberland County towns into LD3 and put more of Atlantic County in LD1. This necessitated some wholesale municipality shifts in LD4 through LD7. Similarly, Hunterdon and Warren counties needed to be placed into different districts to preserve their county boundaries.

Because of their shrinking population share, the Bergen/Essex/Passaic districts were basically redrawn, with one district disappearing entirely. That district, LD34, reappears in southern Somerset County. The middle of the state also saw a total makeover of LD14.

Now, on to the consequences. What would this new map do in terms of minority representation? Answer: probably not much. (See my prior column for a discussion of this issue.)

There would still be one Hispanic majority district. The number of districts with a 40% to 49% Hispanic population would increase from three to five, while the number with between 30% and 39% would decrease from three to one. A total of 12 districts – as compared to the current 13 – would have a Hispanic population of 20% or greater.

There would also continue to be one Black majority district, but the number of districts with a 30% to 49% Black population would decrease from five to one. However, a total of 13 districts – as compared to the current 12 – would have a Black population of 20% or greater.

Also, the number of districts with an Asian population over 20% would remain stable at five.

Next question: What would this new map do in terms of partisan control of the legislature? Answer: probably not much, but it would make for some interesting match-ups this June and November.

Based on voting patterns over the past few election cycles, 23 districts in the current map are in the Democratic domain and 16 are Republican. The remaining one, LD14, has been a split district for most of the past decade and has seen a number of close elections. Looking at the current map another way, 26 districts are “sure-fire” partisan – defined as an average victory margin of 10,000 votes or more for one party or the other. Another 13 are strongly partisan, with average victory margins of 3,000+ votes for a single party.

The new map doesn’t change that much: 23 districts are slam-dunks for one party and 12 are strong likelihoods. The remaining five districts lean toward one party by at least a 1,000 vote margin on average (four Democratic and one Republican). The bottom line gives us 23 Democrat trending districts and 17 Republican ones.

The real fireworks come in the incumbent face-offs that would be a byproduct of this map. Keep in mind that I was purposely blind to who lived where when I drew the map.

There are some Senate match-ups that will ensure this map is nixed by both parties. On the Democratic side, Senate President Steve Sweeney and Donald Norcross both land in LD5 and Nick Scutari and Ray Lesniak share LD20. On the Republican side, we have Joe Kyrillos and Jen Beck in LD13 and Tony Bucco and Joe Pennacchio in LD26.

Cross-party incumbent face-offs are led by Minority Leader Tom Kean and Bob Smith in LD22, where the Republican would have a slight advantage based on recent voting patterns. GOP stalwart Gerald Cardinale squares off with Bob Gordon in LD39, which leans to the Democratic side. The most interesting race would involve a primary between Nia Gill and former Governor/Senate President Dick Codey in LD27, with the winner likely defeating Kevin O’Toole in the general election.

On the Assembly side, Rible, Angelini, and O’Scanlon would fight it out for the two GOP spots in LD11 and Schroeder, Russo, and Vandervalk would do the same in LD40. Three Democrats, Johnson, Vaineri-Huttle, and Voss would draw straws in LD37.

A GOP leaning LD22 would pit Democrats Green and Stender against Republican Braminck, LD21 teams Majority Leader Cryan and Jasey in a likely win over Munoz, and LD4 includes Democrats Moriarty and Burzichelli along with Republican DeCicco, who will likely take on Fred madden in the Senate contest. LD30, which leans slightly Democratic but could be a toss-up, has three Democrats – Conaway, Benson, and DeAngelo and one Republican – Malone. Somerset County Assembly members Chivukula (D) and Coyle (R) are the sole legislative incumbents in the new LD34 and could face each other for the Senate seat in what is likely to be a Republican victory.

This map appears to meet all the basic federal and state Constitutional criteria for drawing legislative districts. However, I’m not necessarily advocating for its adoption. It may not be the best map for the state – in fact, it probably isn’t. But it does show what happens if you try to stick to certain rules over other considerations.

Next up – my take on a more competitive map.

The Latino Dilemma – The Numbers

Cross-posted at PolitickerNJ

[2/18 note: There is some debate whether Portuguese-American Albert Coutinho should be counted as a Latino legislator.]

My last column examined the legal underpinnings of redistricting in terms of suggestions offered by New Jersey’s Latino community. In this column, I break down the numbers behind some of those proposals.

Keep in mind that the key concern raised by testimony at recent public hearings is to increase Latino representation. It currently stands at 6% of the legislature versus 18% of the total population.

One proposed district is based on the premise that the Latino populations of Paterson and Passaic form a joint “community of interest.” The courts have said that keeping communities of interest intact is an important consideration. These communities are not only racial or ethnic. They can be defined as any group of people who have a common political interest (e.g. residents of rural areas or shore towns which have shared policy concerns).

Federal courts generally frown upon barefaced attempts to split or “crack” communities of interest during the redistricting process, although New Jersey’s commission was able to defend the amount of unpacking in 2001. On the other hand, there does not seem to be a strong legal precedent to force mapmakers to redraw districts specifically to increase the size of communities of interest. [The only caveat being that existing majority minority districts must be maintained.]

As for the case of putting Paterson and Passaic into the same district, the proposal fails at a more basic legal level. Before mapmakers can consider “communities of interest,” they must ensure that each district has a relatively equal population and a contiguous border. That means in order to join Paterson and Passaic, mapmakers must include either Clifton or Elmwood Park/Garfield to maintain contiguity. The former district would have 300,116 residents and the latter would have 265,870. Both options are too far above the 219,797 ideal population size to pass legal muster.

Another idea proposed at the hearings is to put Perth Amboy (78% Hispanic) and New Brunswick (50% Hispanic) in the same district. This one is doable only by joining them with East Brunswick, South River, Sayreville, and South Amboy. This district would have a total population of 220,850 – spot-on under the equal population standard – and would meet most standards for compactness. [Of note, it would also require that Carteret and/or Woodbridge be spun off to a district with Union County towns.]

However, the question remains whether this district would enhance Latino representation. In testimony to the Legislative Apportionment Commission, Perth Amboy’s Mayor Wilda Diaz lamented the fact that her district – the 19th – is represented by three white men. She noted that Hispanics make up 31% of the population in this district.

By comparison, the proposed district anchored by Perth Amboy and New Brunswick would be 36% Hispanic. In fact, that’s the highest percentage you can achieve in any of the possible district configurations that include Perth Amboy. So would an increase from 31% to 36% propel more Latinos into the legislature?

Let’s take a look at the current district populations and representation for both African-Americans and Latinos. Currently, 13 New Jersey legislative districts have populations over 20% Hispanic. Latinos hold seats in just 7 of those districts (or 8 if you include Albert Coutinho in the count). It’s a little better – .4. 5 of 7 – in districts with a Hispanic population of 30% or more. However, of the 21 total legislative seats in these districts, Latinos occupy just 6 (or 29%) 7 (or 33%).

By contrast, 12 New Jersey districts have black populations over 20%. African-American legislators hold seats in 10 of those districts (plus another seat in a district with a smaller black population). It’s 6 of 6 in districts with a 30% or greater black population, with African-Americans holding 10 of these 18 seats (or 56%).

Is there a higher threshold of population share for Latino representation in the state legislature than there is for African-American representation? There is currently one majority minority Latino district in the state – Hudson County’s 33rd, with a 54% Hispanic population. It is represented by a Latino and a Latina in the General Assembly, and a white male in the Senate – who also happens to be mayor of a city that is 85% Hispanic.

Therefore, the Hispanic voters in this district appear to have full opportunity to elect candidates of their preferences (noting that federal guidelines do not say that the preference necessarily has to be for someone of the same race or ethnicity). On the other hand, the neighboring 32nd district has a 49% Hispanic population, but is represented by one Latino in the legislature.

What will happen after the new lines are drawn? The wild card in this is the constitutional need to reduce the number of districts touching Jersey City from three to two. Under one scenario, parts of Jersey City would be pulled out of the 32rd, thus requiring a couple of towns, such as West New York and Guttenberg, to move from the 33rd to the 32nd to even out the population. This would make the 32nd a majority minority district, but may cut the 33rd to below 50% Hispanic.

Another scenario would swap North Bergen and Hoboken and pull in a couple of Bergen County towns, ending up with a 33rd district that is more than 7-in-10 Hispanic, while the 32nd would drop to 3-in-10 Hispanic. Which, if either, option would better enhance Latino representation? It’s not clear.

Even if there is a population tipping point, it’s just not possible to draw many – if any – more districts with significantly higher Latino populations. This is due to the geographic dispersion of the state’s ethnic populations. Groups may be concentrated in certain cities and towns, but it is physically impossible to link those towns on a map that can withstand legal scrutiny.

At the Jersey City hearing, Republican Commissioner Bill Palatucci pointedly asked Assemblywoman Annette Quijano how she first won the Democratic nomination for her seat – by receiving the party line or by primarying a sitting legislator. Not surprisingly, it was the former. This exchange illustrates the reality that ethnic representation has as much, if not more, to do with party organization power than it does with the size of ethnic voting blocs at the polls.

African-Americans have demonstrated success at securing party backing in districts where they comprise more than 1-in-5 residents. Latinos have not enjoyed the same level of success. It’s not clear that any potential map configuration can do much to change that.