Court rules that upcoming board election violates minority voting rights
The Los Angeles Times reports that a state court has taken the unusual step of tossing out, in advance, the results of an upcoming school board election after finding that it violated the terms of the California Voting Rights Act. The court concluded that the Madera Unified School District’s (MUSD) planned at-large elections put Latino candidates at a disadvantage and should be replaced by elections in which the board is divided into electoral districts. “This is a historic decision,” said Robert Rubin, legal director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights (LCCR) of the San Francisco Bat area, which brought the suit. “This is the first time that a court has enjoined an election, at least under this law. And it hopefully will send a signal to other jurisdictions around the state that discriminatory election systems will not be tolerated.”
LCCR’s suit argued that although 82% of MUSD’s 18,500 students are Latino, only one Latino sits on the seven-member school board, and only one other Latino has served on the board in the last 25 years. According Mr. Rubin, since 1996 Latinos have run for school board eight times, but in all but one case have been defeated by what he called “Anglo bloc voting.” Because many Latinos are not citizens or are below the legal voting age, whites have maintained a majority. As a result LCCR called for the creation of voting districts, including at least three with Latino majorities. MUSD spokesman Jake Bragonier stated that while the board does not oppose the judge's injunction, it would not acknowledge wrongdoing. “It was essentially a business decision,” he said. “If we want to fight this, we're going to be paying a lot of money one way or the other—even if we win.” Earlier this year, the city of Modesto settled a voting rights case brought by LCCR over at-large elections for City Council, agreeing to pay $3 million in legal fees. Since March, Mr. Rubin claims LCCR has threatened to sue 20 to 25 jurisdictions throughout the state that hold at-large elections in which Latinos appear to be at a disadvantage.
Source: Los Angeles Times, 9/25/08, By Mitchell Landsberg
[Editor’s Note: LCCR’s press release heralding the injunction and a video of the press conference the group held upon filing the suit on August 21 are below. MUSD’s website includes a September 10 announcement of the board’s appointment of a Michael Salvador to fill a vacancy on the board. The next link is to a past Legal Clips highlighting an Allentown Morning Call report on the April 2008 settlement of a challenge brought under the federal Voting Rights Act (VRA) to at-large school board elections in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, as well as an upcoming U.S. Supreme Court case concerning the VRA and other information related to VRA challenges to at-large school board elections. The NSBA resource that follows explores these questions in the context of connections between minority representation on school boards and student achievement gaps. The research cited in that publication and many other related online resources are compiled at the last link.]
LLCR press release on injunction
LCCR press conference on lawsuit
MUSD website
NSBA School Law pages on Voting Right Act litigation
NSBA Leadership Insider on diversity on school boards
NSBA Leadership Insider accompanying resources