Center Studies

50 Years of Political Diversity in Los Angeles, 1959-2009

As part of LCSLA’s signature study, The Leadership Initiative, this project collected information on the 471 individuals to hold the top 100 elected offices in Los Angeles County for the last 50 years. These offices were selected based on constituent size, budget size, and prestige of position. They included Mayor, County Board of Supervisors, District Attorney, County Sheriff, City Attorney, U.S. House of Representatives, State Senate, City Controller, County Assessor, State Assembly, City Council, L.A.U.S.D. School Board, and L.A.C.C.D. Board of Trustees.

As phase one of a multi-year study, this project documented the changing demographics of the elected official positions. Future phases will explain these political and cultural changes and, subsequently, the difference these changes made to local minority policies and politics.

 

2007 Los Angeles Riots 15th Year Anniversary Resident Follow Up Survey Report: April 23, 2007 Final Topline Results

The 1992 riots had a profound impact on nearly every aspect of Los Angeles, from government and community relations to quality of life to demographics. In a longitudinal effort to learn more about this impact, LCSLA researchers conducted surveys in 1997, 2002 and 2007.

 

The 2007 survey was conducted by phone to 1,651 randomly and ethnically represented Los Angeles residents, with a margin of error of +/-3%.

Here are the final topline results.

 

Exit Polls of the 2008 Presidential Primary and National Elections in the City of Los Angeles

As the 2000 presidential election debacle in Florida seems to have indicated, conventional exit polling methodology could benefit from serious consideration. Not only can skewed results lead to inaccurate reporting in the media, as was the case in Florida, but they can also misrepresent voting subgroups such as African American and Latino voters.

In an attempt to obtain more accurate exit poll data and therefore better represent these subgroups, a team of LCSLA researchers developed the “racially stratified homogenous precinct approach.” As explained in their article Controversies in Exit Polling: Implementing a Racially Stratified Homogenous Precinct Approach, this methodology theorizes that polling data is more accurate when it targets subgroup enclaves, as opposed to singling out individuals from these groups living in more integrated communities.

The LCSLA had the opportunity to put the methodology into action, as well as study the relationships between politics, race, and community with their Exit Polls of the 2008 Presidential Primary and National Elections in the City of Los Angeles. The two projects were supported by a grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation.

• The LCSLA Presidential Primary Exit Poll

  The presidential Primary Exit Poll was conducted on February 5, 2008. Nearly 200 LMU students distributed anonymous exit poll surveys in both English and Spanish in 50 randomly and ethnically represented precincts. They collected 2,702 surveys with a +/-1.88% margin of error.
  Here are the results.

• The LCSLA Presidential National Election Exit Poll

  The Presidential National Election Exit Poll took place on November 4, 2008. The students collected 2,725 anonymous surveys in Spanish and English, again from 50 randomly and ethnically represented precincts. The margin of error was also  +/-1.88%.
  Here are the results. 

 

2003 California Absentee Voter Survey

In the 2003 California gubernatorial recall election, roughly 30% of voters used absentee ballots. The increasing propensity in California and elsewhere to choose this voting method brings up two basic questions: Who are absentee voters, and are they different from polling place voters?

To answer these questions, LCSLA conducted the California Absentee Voter Survey by telephone three days prior to the October 7, 2003, election. The poll of 300 absentee voters statewide who had already completed their absentee ballot has a margin of sampling error of ± 5% and a response rate of 24%.

To assess the differences between absentee voters and Election Day voters, survey results from the California Absentee Voter Survey were compared with Los Angeles Times exit polls for the recall election.