Councilors push to settle vote lawsuit

Jeremy Schwab

Just one week after community groups shot off a letter to Mayor Thomas Menino and the members of the city council demanding they settle a voting rights lawsuit, four city councilors joined in the call for a settlement.

Councilors Chuck Turner, Felix Arroyo, Charles Yancey and Maura Hennigan held a press conference Monday calling on Menino to work out solutions to the alleged violations of the rights of non-English fluent voters.

Menino has indicated he will fight the lawsuit in court, and his office has questioned the Justice Department’s assertions.

The lawsuit alleges that the city’s “elections standards, practices and procedures” negatively affected limited English proficient Latino and Asian American voters and seeks federal oversight of city elections until 2007.

Community groups reportedly supplied the Justice Department with information about voting rights violations they have witnessed in recent years in neighborhoods across the city. Alleged violations include a lack of bilingual election workers at some polls, voters from certain ethnic groups being told to produce unnecessary documentation and poll workers filling out limited English-speaking voters’ ballots for them or watching as political operatives pretend to be poll workers and tell voters who they should vote for. Activists had also notified the city of their concerns.

Some city councilors lashed out at their colleagues who are calling for a settlement, saying they should wait to hear what specific allegations the suit contains before taking sides.

“I think it’s a mistake to admit guilt until we have all the facts in place,” said Councilor Rob Consalvo. “Obviously in America, you are innocent until proven guilty. The city is working very hard to correct any problems that may have happened with people’s right to vote.”

The councilors calling for a settlement unveiled a list of changes they say the city should make in order to mitigate the Justice Department’s allegations.

“If an agreement could be reached with community groups, then the Justice Department lawsuit could be resolved,” said Turner.

Just days after the lawsuit was filed, Menino announced the establishment of a task force composed of members of groups involved in get-out-the-vote and community advocacy work.

Headed by Kevin Peterson, director of the New Democracy Coalition, the task force is charged with recruiting and training more bilingual poll workers for next month’s Democratic primary and November’s general election.

“We’ll also be looking at internal election department changes as well as public policy initiatives that will provide better access to the polls,” said Peterson.

The city’s chief of policy and planning, Michael Kineavy, said the creation of the task force was not in response to concerns over alleged voting rights violations.

But Lydia Lowe, the executive director of the Chinese Progressive Association, scoffed at his assertion.

“I think it is not a coincidence the task force was created and announced three days after the lawsuit was filed, and in fact it was announced in a statement by the mayor in which he directly talked about fighting the lawsuit,” said Lowe.

Lowe criticized the administration for failing to include her group, which has been the main group working on voter education and registration in Chinatown in recent years, on the task force. Many of the most egregious allegations of voting rights violations occurred in Chinatown during the 2003 elections.

“I think it shows a less than sincere effort to work on remedies to voting rights problems,” said Lowe.

Task force member Giovanna Negretti said she hopes the group, which is expected to meet regularly until mid-December, pushes public policy changes.

“My expectation is… we don’t just focus on this election, though it is an important one,” said Negretti, executive director of the Latino political group ¿Oiste?. “I would put on the table same-day registration, multilingual voting machines and other long-term measures.”