Look for this Postcard in the Mail. Sortition Begins in Historic LA City Charter Assembly
Los Angeles city is having the first-ever civic assembly in the history of Southern California, starting February 28. This is one of the first to take place in the U.S.
The process of picking the assembly is done through a process called sortition.
How does it work? It starts by sending out postcards like the one pictured here to 20,000 addresses in a city, in this case LA, chosen at random. The postcards invite people to indicate their interest in joining the assembly. They do that by filling out a form online that includes their name and demographic information about themselves.
Let’s say 500 people respond to the 20,000 letters. The demographic information from those 500 people is put into a software program, called Panelot. And the program, drawing from those 500 people, then spits out 1,000 versions of an assembly—a 40-person assembly in this case—that would be representative of the population of the city of Los Angeles
Then, one of those 1,000 versions is chosen by lot. That’s your assembly.
Did I mention that assembly members are paid for their time? With real money, not gift cards. In this assembly, payments for assembly members should exceed $500 each.
So if you live in the city of LA, or have friends there, please remember to watch the mail in the next several days for these postcards.
