Former City Council Member Carroll Robinson, who has been a strong proponent for redistricting City Council boundaries and drawing two new districts now rather than waiting till 2011, has said that the city should not fear any litigation that might result from such an action. Clearly, Robinson himself does not fear it.
Community activists have filed a lawsuit alleging the City of Houston has violated the Voting Rights Act by putting off the redistricting of city council boundaries as required by its own charter and a decades-old court settlement.
The lawsuit, which seeks to force the city to begin redrawing voting boundaries, could have far-reaching implications, including delaying an upcoming special election to fill the council seat vacated by Sheriff Adrian Garcia and, possibly, even the November elections, plaintiffs claim.
Mayor Bill White, all 13 council members and City Controller Annise Parker are named as co-defendants in the suit, which was filed in federal court today.
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The city’s failure to take that action has galvanized minority leaders, who see the creation of new seats as a chance to increase the number of minorities on City Council.
“The result of that breach is lack of representation at City Hall by a significant portion of the community,” said Vidal Martinez, a former Port of Houston Authority commissioner who is litigating the suit with former city councilman Carroll Robinson.
“The need for leadership to protect the voting rights of Houstonians is why we have acted today to seek the help of the U.S. Justice Department and the federal court to make sure that the city charter is complied with,” Robinson said.
In a city made up of 41.7 percent Hispanics, 24.3 percent African-Americans and 5.3 percent Asian-Americans, according to the U.S. Census, there is one Latino council member, four African-Americans and one Asian-American.
The irony, of course, is that if the plaintiffs get what they want, the delay of the special election in District H will mean there will continue to be only one Hispanic on Council for however much longer. I guess they believe that the short-term loss is worth the long-term gain. Speaking as a resident of District H, I can’t say I’m terribly happy about this.
I just can’t excuse the decision to not take action in 2006, which would have settled all of this by now. Given that we put things off then, it makes sense to say we should wait till 2011 now. In a vacuum, I’d totally agree with that. But we could have headed this off, and we chose not to. I don’t see how the path we didn’t take could have been any messier than the one we appear to be about to take.