Philadelphia Daily News (PA)
Copyright 2006 The hPhiladelphia Daily News
October 27, 2006

By Regina Medina, The Philadelphia Daily News

When she finally received a ballot, according to her statement in a federal court document filed this week, the woman - identified as "B. Montijo" - couldn't understand what she saw in the booth. "I voted without understanding who, or what, I was voting for."

After that fateful day, she said, she'll only vote in presidential elections. "If local officials are not interested in helping me receive Spanish language assistance in order to vote correctly, then I feel that it is not necessary for me to vote for them," she said in the new filing.

The allegations raised this week come as part of Department of Justice lawsuit against the city, filed earlier this month, alleging Philadelphia violates the voting rights of Spanish-speaking citizens.

Justice officials wrote in the new court papers that they seek to prevent Philadelphia "from continuing to violate the rights of minority voters." Specifically, it said the city must translate all election materials into Spanish and provide bilingual personnel at polling places where 5 percent or more of the voters are Spanish-speaking.

But some leaders in the local Latino community say they don't really need or want any help from the GOP administration.

Yesterday, a group of Latino advocates, city officials and African-American clergy and activists protested the lawsuit at a press conference, saying the timing of the suit so close to a midterm election was suspicious and a form of voter intimidation.

"We're very concerned about Big Brother taking care of us," said Luis P. Diaz, an attorney with the nonprofit Latino Advocacy Project.

The feds in polling places may have a "chilling effect" on Latino voters, Diaz said. "They could have worries about income taxes. They could have relatives who are here illegally. They could have troubles with Social Security."

Added J. Whyatt Mondesire, head of the local chapter of the NAACP: "Voter suppression has been going on in this country for too damn long."

But some Latinos support the federal lawsuit.

"It's a comforting sight," said Angel Medina, with the Pennsylvania Statewide Latino Coalition, referring to the lawsuit. "It addresses the issues we've had from 31 years ago."

He was referring to the 1974 landmark case of Arroyo v. Tucker that mandated both the translation and bilingual staffing in Spanish-speaking areas.

Some unnamed Latino agencies helped gather information about voters' complaints, working with the nonpartisan watchdog group the Committee of Seventy.

"What we saw in the May primary, there may be legitimate form of concern here," said the committee's president, Zack Stalberg. Among the concerns: insufficient numbers of translators fluent in Spanish, hostility to Spanish-speaking voters, and illegal assistance to voters, he said.

City Solicitor Romulo Diaz said yesterday at the press conference that the Department of Justice had been allowed to observe the last two elections, including the May primary.

The city was told in September by Justice officials to accept federal observers who could be inside Philadelphia's voting booths, but the city declined, said Abbe Fletman, lead outside counsel for the city.