Houston’s at-large City Council districts deprive Latinos of fair representation, lawsuit alleges

Houston City Hall on Oct. 2, 2017. (Credit: Pu Ying Huang for The Texas Tribune)

Citing the underrepresentation of Latinos on Houston’s City Council, one of the nation’s oldest Latino civil rights organizations is suing in hopes of undoing the system the nation’s fourth-largest city uses to elect its governing body.

In a federal lawsuit filed Monday, the League of United Latin American Citizens and four individual Latino residents allege the city undercuts the voting strength of Latino voters by continuing to elect five of its 16 council members through at-large elections, in which all city voters are able to vote. Eleven council members are elected from individual districts.