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Who draws the lines?

Big push on for local redistricting

By Sameea Kamal CalMatters

In damning audio leaked last fall, three Los Angeles City Councilmembers made a bevy of racist comments about Black, Jewish, Armenian and Oaxacan people. Then the conversation turned to how they could get the city’s redistricting commission, which they appointed, to draw council maps that would allow them to stay in office.

“If we can slice and dice this baby up to cut you off where you think that favorable people are in … I’m all for that,” Nury Martinez, who resigned after the leak, said at one point. “I just need to know what I’m working with, with this map.”

The council adopted a map that disregarded suggestions from the advisory commission and that kept resource-rich Exposition Park out of the one Black-majority district.

Across California, new districts were drawn after the 2020 Census, as they are every

Police pursuit ends in fatal collision in downtown Davis

By Lauren Keene Enterprise staff writer

A pursuit involving a UC Davis police officer and another vehicle resulted in a fatal collision Thursday night in downtown Davis. The officer sustained minor injuries.

According to a statement from UCD officials, the chase began shortly before 9:30 p.m. when the patrol officer spotted a Toyota Scion speeding through the intersection of Russell Boulevard and Sycamore Lane, just north of campus.

“The officer engaged their lights and siren and attempted to catch up to the speeding vehicle to make a traffic stop, but they continued at high speed running red lights east on Russell onto Fifth Street,” the statement said.

That’s where the suspect vehicle hit a concrete median at the Fifth Street railroad crossing east of G Street, “came to an abrupt stop and burst into flames,” officials said.

UCD officers in another vehicle pulled the driver from the burning car and attempted medical aid, but he succumbed to his injuries at the scene.

The patrol vehicle also struck the median, causing

See FATAL, Page A5

10 years, to make sure that every congressional, legislative and local district has about the same number of people. But who is grouped together in a district can empower or disenfranchise a community. And until 2010, on both the state and local levels, the mapping was done by elected officials themselves, often

See LINES, Page A5

The UC Davis administration and the Associated Students have asked comedian Hasan Minhaj to speak at the 2023 commencement on either on June 16, 17 or 18, The California Aggie reported last week.

A writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and television host of Indian descent, Davis native Hasan Minhaj won two Peabody Awards and two Webby Awards.

MINHAJ Davis grad

Minhaj graduated from Davis High School in 2003 and then attended UC Davis, from where he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in political science in 2007.

A keynote speaker at the Davis High graduation in 2015, Minhaj urged the graduates to keep trying no matter what adversities stand in the way. Speaking from his youth, being the victim of racism and bullying, and not having made come true his biggest dream of the time — playing on the Blue Devils basketball team — Minhaj shifted gears in college

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CoUrtesy graPhiC

A rendering of the proposed “Davis Collection” redesign of the University Mall site.

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