Bench diversity article only gave a partial picture

In the March 2 article, "Brown's judge picks made bench more diverse," the Daily Journal once again shines a bright light on the importance of a diverse bench -- something the Brown administration strongly supports.

Unfortunately, readers are given a partial, distorted snapshot of the unprecedented progress being made to diversify the bench under Gov. Jerry Brown.

For reasons that aren't entirely clear, the article ignores nearly all of the statistical data that was published regarding the demographics of Gov. Brown's appointees. Instead, the piece relies almost exclusively on historical demographic data pertaining to every judge on the bench -- whether they were appointed 30 years ago by another governor or three years ago by the current governor -- to conclude that Gov. Brown's own appointments have been inconsequential with respect to diversity.

Readers then may be surprised to learn that:

• Almost 40 percent of the Brown administration's judicial appointees identify as racial or ethnic minorities (i.e., non-white).

• More than 40 percent of appointees have been women and, last year, more than half of appointees were women.

• 6 percent of all judicial appointees identified as LGBT.

• And 23 percent of veterans who applied were appointed and 18 percent of those with a disability who applied were appointed.

The sea change underway is perhaps more noticeable when one looks at the composition of the State Bar against the governor's appointments. Less than 20 percent of State Bar members identify as racial or ethnic minorities, while, as noted above, more than 40 percent of the governor's appointees identify as racial or ethnic minorities.

Digging a little deeper, Asian-Americans, which make up 5.9 percent of State Bar membership, represent 9.1 percent of the governor's appointees. African-Americans are just 1.9 percent of State Bar members, but 10.4 percent of appointees. While Hispanics constitute 4.6 percent of the State Bar, they are 16.2 percent of appointees.

The appointments made under this administration are by far the most diverse in the history of the state. We agree that there's much more work ahead, but let's not ignore the important strides that have already been made.

Readers can view these statistics for themselves at https://www.gov.ca.gov/2018/03/01/governor-brown-releases-2017-judicial-appointment-data/