The City of Yakima has latched onto the coat tails of a Texas lawsuit before the nation’s highest court seeking to limit the principle of “one person – one vote.” Last February, a Spokane federal judge ordered the city to elect council representatives by district, rather than at large, reasoning that Latino candidates could not gain a political foothold under the at-large system.
Under the new plan, Yakima wound up with two predominantly Latino districts, but in one of them, Latinos of voting age are still in the minority.
The city argues in the Texas case that voting districts should be drawn based on the number of eligible voters, rather than the accepted use of total population. In Yakima, many of the residents in the new districts are not citizens – thus, ineligible to vote.
Full Article: Yakima Urges High Court to Overturn Election District Makeup | Spokane Public Radio.