ACLU Threatens Lawsuit to Re-District City of Pasco Voting Areas
In an effort to 'fix' what they believe is a problem of under-representation of minorities in the City of Pasco when it comes to the City Council, the ACLU is using the thinly-veiled threat of a lawsuit to pressure the city into dividing it differently for voting.
According to news reports, the ACLU claims the city's method of using at-large voting to elect council members reportedly unlawfully dilutes the Latino vote and prevents candidates from running and being elected. The ACLU believes it has momentum, coming off a successful lawsuit in Yakima that cost the city $2.8 million dollars.
The ACLU had reached out to the city in March and mentioned a lawsuit, but met Tuesday with city officials with what they say are hopes they can redraw the Pasco districts. The ACLU instead wants the city divided into 7 districts, which they say would allow representatives from areas heavily populated with minorities to have a council representative.
One of the parties involved in this process is Felix Vargas, who is a member of the group Cansejo Latino. They were one of the first groups to criticize the Pasco Police Department following the shooting of Antonio Zambrano. Very little is known about who this group is, where they meet, what their mission statement is, except what's repeated in some media reports. Numerous information searches turn up nothing, except that they are credited in some media with being a community activist organization.
The ACLU says a Latino has run in almost every City Council election, but because of Pasco's at-large system, none of them have been elected. Yakima recently lost a lawsuit against the ACLU over the same issue, and now votes by District. They dropped their appeal against the ACLU earlier this year.
However, critics say dividing by Districts is a thinly-veiled attempt to use ethnicity to gain political control and influence policies. They point out that even with at-large voting, if a candidate gets enough votes, they will win a position on the City Council, regardless of where they are from or their ethnic backround.
Critics also point to what they say with Pasco being made up of 55 percent Hispanics, and nearly 1/3 of registered voters being Latinos as well, there are ample opportunities to get elected.
The ACLU counters by saying that Latino-Hispanic votes are diluted by the at-large voting. Voters select council candidates regardless of where they live in the city. Pasco does use districts but only in the primary where the candidates are "whittled down." At-large or city wide voting is used in the general election. The ACLU says by having seven districts, it guarantees better representation on the council.