Fernando Florez l Why Redistricting is Important to the Hispanic Community in Ft Worth l Nuestra Voz...
Transcript of Fernando Florez l Why Redistricting is Important to the Hispanic Community in Ft Worth l Nuestra Voz...
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HISTORIA CH ICANA17 September 2013
----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Fernando Florez
Date: Tue, 17 Sep 2013 22:04:45 -0600
Subject: Why Redistricting is Important to the Hispanic Community in Fort Worth
IN MY OPINION...
Why Redistr icting I s Important to the
H ispanic Communi ty in Fort Worth
By Fernando FlorezSeptember 1, 2013
Special to Nuestra Voz de Tar rant County
Source: Fort Worth Redistricting, URL:http://fortworthtexas.gov/redistricting/?id=99802
Shortly after the end of World War II one of my friend's father returned home toFort Worth after his military service. A few days later he and a friend went to a
restaurant downtown. They sat down at a table to order and soon a waiter came over
mailto:[email protected]://fortworthtexas.gov/redistricting/?id=99802http://fortworthtexas.gov/redistricting/?id=99802http://fortworthtexas.gov/redistricting/?id=99802http://fortworthtexas.gov/redistricting/?id=99802mailto:[email protected] -
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and told them: "We don't serve Mexicans." With his great sense of humor, my friend's
father replied to the waiter: "We weren't going to order one" and left the restaurant.
Being discriminated against and disrespected in other ways was not uncommon for
Hispanics in this and other parts of Texas and the Southwest. But in part because of
the military contributions of Spanish, Mexican-Americans and Tejanos to the United
States going as far back as the American Revolutionary War, which have not everbeen fully recognized to this day, injustices such as this one were catching the public's
eye and the winds of change were already blowing slightly.
In Los Angeles, California, the state with the highest Mexican-American
population in the United States, school children were segregated in "Mexican
Schools," which were of inferior quality. In Mendez v. Westminster, in 1947, the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled that racially segregating children of Mexican and Latin descent
in state operated public schools in Orange County and the state of California was
unconstitutional. This ruling helped establish the foundation forBrown v. Board of
Education, the landmark case which ended public school segregation throughout the
U. S. in 1954.
In many areas Mexican-Americans were kept off juries in cases which involved
Mexican-American defendants. In 1954, here in Texas, Pete Hernandez, an
agricultural worker, was indicted of murder by an all-non-Hispanic White jury in
Jackson County. Hernandez' attorneys believed that unless members of other races
were allowed on the jury-selecting committees a jury could not be impartial. A
Mexican-American had not been on a jury for more than 25 years in Jackson County.
Hernandez and his attorneys took the case to the U. S. Supreme Court which in
Hernandez v. Texas Supreme Court declared that Mexican-Americans and other
cultural groups' rights were equally protected by the 14th Amendment of the United
States Constitution. This was a significant step forward; however, some organizations,
businesses and homeowner associations still had official policies that excluded
Mexican-Americans. Well into the 60s, for instance, a few signs with phrases such as
"No Dogs or Mexicans" were still posted at a few small businesses and swimming
pools in some parts of the Southwest. Disenfranchisement, manifested by lack of
representation, was the cause of the discrimination and it affected Hispanics in all
aspects of life.
This was also an era of intense racial turmoil for Africian-Americans in the Deep
South, which was given wide coverage by the national media. It was brought into
focus by a march on Washington, D.C. for "Jobs and Progress." Despite the guarantee
of "equal protection" promised by the 14th Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, a
hundred years after the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, African-Americans were
still living in abject poverty, particularly in the Deep South, an area rife with Jim
Crow laws.
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It was on this occasion that Dr. Martin Luther King, standing in front of the
Lincoln Memorial, delivered to 250,000 civil rights supporters and a national
television audience his memorable "I have a Dream" speech on August 28, 1963.
The large gathering and speech aroused the conscience of the nation and
helped usher the Civil Rights Act the following year and the Voting Rights Act in1965. So what does all I've said have to do with redistricting? Everything.
Redistricting is about protecting voting rights and thus increasing the chance of
having more representation. Representation is about having a voice where policies are
enacted and has a broad impact: It affects opportunity for a better education for
children, jobs, housing, and about everything else.
While I was growing up in South Texas, in the Rio Grande Valley, political
power was almost exclusively held in the hands of non-Hispanics who advocated
maintaining the status quo, with the vast majority of Hispanics as the underclass. Surethere were plenty of jobs--harvesting crops there in the valley itself and doing migrant
work up north, following seasonal crops in several states, los trabajos-- without much
of an opportunity of ever moving up to the middle class and a better life.
It was not until toward the latter part of the 1970s that Hispanics were elected to
the majority of the public offices. Today, because it sank so low, the Rio Grande
Valley is an area in transformation--it's slowing rising.
I came to work at General Dynamics here in Fort Worth as an electronics
technician/ technical writer after my Army discharge in 1968. There has been somechange here since that time, but what is still prevalent is the same attitude that those
with the political power in the Rio Grande Valley had when I was growing up:
Maintain the status quo by keeping the same people or those of their ilk, who opposed
sharing political power with Hispanics, in control. I never thought that was right then
nor that it's right now--no matter how it's spinned, it's simply wrong to keep Hispanics
or any other group from having their voice heard-- and it's the reason I am involved in
redistricting.
Redistricting involves drawing electoral districts' boundaries. Because of a long
history of discrimination, especially in the South, Texas and the Southwest, and tocomply with the Voting Rights Act, boundaries must be drawn in a manner that will
protect the voting rights of minorities. Here in Texas, there is redistricting of U. S.
Congressional districts and of state Senate and House of Representative districts, by
the legislature. (Briefly, in the North Texas area, the legislature has drawn districts
that minimize the chances for Hispanics to be elected to office, by diluting the impact
of their votes, and some lawsuits are pending.)
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There is other information associated with redistricting that is significant: A
recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling has gutted part of Section 5 of the Voting Rights
Act (VRA) and as a result the Texas Voter I.D. law that was passed in the last session
of the legislature (when there is no evidence that it was needed) will be implemented.
The latter, an anti-minority voter suppression scheme, is being challenged in court by
several Hispanic groups and the U.S. Justice Department.
I am focusing my discussion on Fort Worth redistricting, which is what I've been
involved in for nearly twenty-five years. I am briefly reviewing what we've done in
regards to both Fort Worth City Council and Fort Worth Independent School District
(FWISD) redistricting the last couple of years and what it looks like for the future as
the battles continues.
Fort Worth City Council redistricting: Fort Worth adopted an 8-1 single-member
city council-mayor electoral system in 1977. Prior to that, in a typical election, the top
nine vote getters--all of them usually lived in two of the most affluent areas of thecity--were elected. They in turn selected the mayor. At that time the population of Fort
Worth was approximately half of what it was in the 2010 census count. The Hispanic
population of Fort Worth was not very high then, but in the 2010 census the total
population of the city was 742,765, with 34% of it Hispanic; the Anglo-White
population was 42%, African-American 18% and other 6%. Between the last two
census cycles, the only group that showed a percentage increase in population was
Hispanics.
Because Fort Worth prides itself as being a diverse city, we have been trying to
convince the city council to change its electoral system to be more inclusive bydrawing more than one district in which a Hispanic has a chance of being elected.
Sure, we know that the Hispanic population is somewhat scattered, and that it
includes non-citizens in it, but if district lines are drawn properly it can be done. Two
strong majority Hispanic functional districts can easily be created by converting to a
10-1 electoral system and that was the focus of our redistricting effort early on, right
after the 2010 census data came out. But it was an uphill battle from the start because
the majority of city council members' main focus was to protect their self-interest,
their turf, and the best way to do that was by keeping the same system in place. Any
change to the electoral system would have to be first approved by the city council
itself, or forced on them by collecting enough signatures on a petition, before it would
go to the voters to decide the issue and amend the city's charter. Our petition drive
campaign's rallying cry to force the city council to call an election was "Let the People
Decide," but we couldn't muster enough public support. Very few people seem to care
whether Hispanics have fair representation--except Hispanics.
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After that, we redrew new maps for an 8-1 electoral plan, focusing on creating a
second strong functional majority Hispanic district, in the city's south side (district 9).
After some negotiation, some slight changes were made to the city's map, but not
enough. Still left in the district were five precincts west of 8th Avenue; those precincts
are 90% plus Anglo-White, Republican, (except Mistletoe Heights, Precinct 1076,
which is more liberal and the vote is usually split between Democrats andRepublicans in major elections), much more affluent, with a higher educational level
and household income (at the middle to upper middle class level), and with higher
property values. By contrast those precincts east of 8th Avenue, such as South
Hemphill Heights, Worth Heights, and Rosemont, are majority Hispanic in
population; people there have a much lower educational level and household income
and they vote for Democrats in major elections; the two areas have no "Communities
of Interest." In other words, these two areas have nothing in common and should not
be in the same council district. More affluent people, with more education and higher
income, vote at higher rates, and in Fort Worth as a bloc for White-Anglo candidates,
overwhelming minority candidates from the rest of the district. The precincts west of
8th Avenue have won every competitive election in District 9 since Fort Worth went
to single-member districts in 1977. This is not conjecture, but based on the research
we've done. We fought hard for our plans (three of them were submitted for
consideration), but, unfortunately, lost that battle. Over our objection, the city adopted
their plan on July 24, 2012 and submitted it to the U.S. Department of Justice for
preclearance under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.
(In the city's plan, the total population in City Council District 9 was 91,140,
with 57.72% of it Hispanic. The total Hispanic population percentage looks good on
paper, but a clearer picture of City Council District 9 emerges after looking at the map
more closely: The total estimated citizen population for the district using American
Community Survey (ACS) data was 69,060; the estimated citizen population for non-
Hispanics was 36,775. The total estimated Citizen Voting Age Population (CVAP) for
the district was 46,540; the estimated non-Hispanic CVAP was 31,360 and the
estimated Hispanic CVAP was 15,180. From this data, it can be seen that the Hispanic
population is young and some of it is non-citizen. Approximately two thirds of its
voting age population is non-Hispanic. Throw in the polarized, bloc voting west of 8th
Avenue in the mix and it's no wonder that every contested election in the district has
been won by an Anglo.)
We objected to the city's plan with the Federal Justice Department, but without
going into too much detail here, we knew our chances of prevailing were slim. On
October 1, 2012, we and the city's attorney were notified that their plan was
precleared.
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So was putting up the fight we did worth it? Without a doubt, absolutely. First,
Section 5 of the VRA is mainly about retrogression--not about a population that is
increasing, such as Hispanics--and the maps we submitted show that if the city council
had adopted one of them we would have created a second Hispanic district in the
south side. That leads us to Section 2 of the VRA, which places much stricter
standards for the city to meet, but the burden of proof is ours. (Again, I couldn'tpossibly cover all of that in this short space.) As I write this, lets just say that a lawsuit
against the city is a strong possibility. Stay tuned.
Fort Worth Independent School District (FWISD) redistricting: With respect to
FWISD redistricting, we have also been fighting a tough and contentious battle for the
same reason as city council redistricting: fair representation, commensurate to the
Hispanic population. With an approximately 62% Hispanic student population in the
district (the African-Americans student population was 23.28%, and Anglo-Whites
nearly 12% out of approximately 82,000 students in the district during the last school
year), we sought a third seat out of nine when the position of school board president
elected-at-large was eliminated last year and an additional single-member district was
created. Looking at the treatment of minority students historically here in Fort
Worth, in other parts of the Texas, in the Deep South and in the Southwest and with
the vast majority of school children in the district being Hispanic, what was so
unreasonable about drawing an additional Hispanic majority district? We simply
must have a stronger voice on the school board where policy affecting the future of
our children is made. We are not racists as some of us have been called, but instead,
we tried to right a wrong--having an unequal voice on the school board. After months
of battling, a third Hispanic leaning district was created and a Hispanic was appointed
to it; but neither District 8 nor District 9, the two Hispanics leaning districts which
were newly redrawn were as strong as they should have been.
The establishment fought us hard and helping them was our major daily
newspaper, which unfairly took their side; we were badmouthed for "seeking more
political power," as if that wasn't justified. With the increased xenophobia being
directed against Hispanics everywhere we are seeing a higher level of polarized
voting. That, and the nitpicking by one of the newspaper's writers and the editorial
board over a period of time, and the money pumped into the race by the special
interests against him, Juan Rangel, the incumbent, lost the runoff election by 23votes on June 15, 2013. In my opinion, in District 8 the threat of having to raise large
sums of money to mount viable campaigns dissuaded two genuine Hispanic
candidates from staying in the race for that seat.
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The establishment is fighting us hard to keep Hispanics off the school board.
Today, we have essentially one Hispanic on the FWISD Board of Education. But the
last chapter in this saga has not been written yet. Again, stay tuned.
Fernando Florez has been a community leader in Fort Worth for nearly twenty-five years, having
served in numerous capacities at the grassroots level and on city government boards. He has atechnical background in telecommunications, as a human resources manager and as an educator.
He holds BBA and MBA degrees from Texas Christian University. What he has written here is
solely his opinion. He may be contacted [email protected] 817.239.0578.
H istor ia Chicana
Mexican American StudiesUniversity of North Texas
Denton, Texas
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]