Wiltsie v. Board of Supervisors

PEEK, J.

Petitioners, electors of the County of Inyo, by mandate, seek to compel a redistricting of the five supervisorial districts of that county in such a manner that no district will have a population in excess of 23% nor less than 17 % of the overall population of the county.

The record discloses the present population distribution between the districts, based on an estimated 1965 census, as follows:

Estimated Pereent of Total Estimated

Population Population in County District No. 1 .... ........4,736 33.9% District No.

2 ....

........3,039 21.7% District No. 3 .... ........2,567 18.4% District No. 4 .... ........2,265 16.2% District No. 5 .... ........1,365 9.8% Total ......... .......13,972 100.0%

We recently held in

Miller

v.

Board of Supervisors

(1965) 63 Cal.2d 343 [46 Cal.Rptr. 617, 405 P.2d 857], relying on the provisions of section 25001

1

of the Government Code and more particularly on the constitutional mandate of the equal protection clause (see

Reynolds

v.

Sims

(1964) 377 U.S. 533 [12 L.Ed.2d 506, 84 S.Ct. 1362] ;

Lucas

v.

Forty-Fourth General Assembly of Colorado

(1964) 377 U.S. 713 [12 L.Ed.2d 632, 84 S.Ct. 1472]), that there is a presumption of

[316]

validity of the districting in a county of five districts, where no district contains more than 23 percent nor less than 17 percent of the overall population of the county. Such a standard would allow for a population ratio of 1.35 to 1 between the most and least populous districts. Earlier, and before the pronouncements of the United States Supreme Court in those cases cited herein, we approved a ratio of 2.2 to 1 in Monterey County.