Residents working behind the scenes to keep District 5 and 6 on PACC
Published 7:07 pm Wednesday, November 15, 2017
By David Ball
Last year, voters approved a charter change election to the city of Port Arthur charter eliminating Districts 5 and 6 on the city council.
Willie “Bae” Lewis Jr., District 5 councilman, however, said citizens have been calling the U.S. Department of Justice since the measure passed in an attempt to overturn election results and keep Districts 5 and 6.
“They’ve been calling since day one,” Lewis said. “They entered a protest to the Department of Justice under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. You can’t arbitrarily negatively impact minorities.”
Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 prohibits voting practices or procedures that discriminate on the basis of race or color.
One resident who has been contacting the DOJ is Gloria Sanchez.
She wants to stop Districts 5 and 6 from being eliminated because she thinks those districts offer the best opportunity for electing a representative for the Hispanic community. Sanchez added that Port Arthur has a large Hispanic community that’s not represented. Many reside in District 2.
“We have no representation at all,” she said. “The African-American community is the only minority community represented on the city council. (Osman) Swati (District 6 councilman) is the only one up there of a different race.”
Sanchez said Districts 5 and 6 were created several years ago to sit a minority on the council.
“I tried the state first, then the feds,” she said. “The feds said they will try to put it on the next ballot (keeping Districts 5 and 6), but I don’t know when that will be. They said they will find out everything about the charter change election.”
Sanchez added that the DOJ officials said they have received numerous telephone calls from Port Arthur residents to keep the two district seats.
However, the DOJ did not confirm this and they declined to comment for this story.
Sanchez said she doesn’t know if Lewis will stay on the council or not if the charter change election is overturned.
“We want to work together for the whole city,” Sanchez said.
Lewis acknowledged Hispanic residents have filed lawsuits against the city of Pasadena with the DOJ in a similar situation.
“Citizens can file for an injunction and then to go to the courts on the merits of the case under Section 2 to block implementation,” he said. “Positions 7 and 8 (on the city council) need to be placed on plurality of the vote. The two top vote-getters get to serve.”
Lewis said whatever the results are he will do what the voters want him to do
