At-large is historically regressive

At-large voting was created after the Civil War in the South for the purpose of keeping minorities out of office. In 1967 Congress required single-member districts instead of at-large voting to stop Southern states from using at-large to block minorities from Congress. In 1982 Congress amended the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to prohibit at-large voting when its effect is to dilute minority vote—even if that's not intended.

Minorities are represented by districts, not at-large

Phyllis Clark, the City Clerk of Urbana, is the first and only African-American elected to at-large citywide office in Urbana's 171-year history. Champaign, which still has 3 at-large City Council seats, elected Giraldo Rosales in 2001, making him the first minority elected at-large in 33 years.

Diluting minorities

Currently, the Urbana City Council is 1/7th African-American, just as 1/7th of Urbana's population is African-American. Since at-large seats almost never elect minority candidates, we can be assured that at-large would dilute minority representation in Urbana's city government, with African-American representation immediately shifting to 1/9th of the council. This disparity would grow over time, as African-Americans are on track to make up 1/5th of Urbana's population within the next 10 years.

Other Illinois cities end at-large voting

• Springfield removed at-large in 1987 when legal action forced the City to comply with the Voting Rights Act. Attorney Frank McNeil became the first black elected since 1911.
• Danville eliminated at-large in 1987. Prior to that time, no women or minorities (just white men) had ever served on the City Commission. Since that time, 5 African-American men, 8 women, a Hispanic, a person of American Indian heritage, and a black female City Treasurer have been elected.
• Cook County Board eliminated at-large seats in a 1990 voter referendum.
• The citizens of Urbana eliminated at-large elections for the school board in 1998 because of poor minority representation on that all-white body.

What about "mixed" systems?

While Springfield and Danville's electoral systems were fully at-large, the system being proposed in Urbana is referred to as a "mixed" system—one made up of both districts and at-large. Proponents of the proposed change suggest this is an important distinction, one which makes all of the scientific evidence "irrelevant." But the leading scholars in political science have studied mixed systems as well. Susan Welch, a leading researcher on the effects of at-large elections on minority representation, and Dean and Professor of Political Science at Penn State University states it clearly: "While blacks are equitably represented in the district portions of mixed systems, they are abysmally underrepresented in the at-large portions." It doesn't matter if its fully at-large or mixed—at-large seats dilute minority representation no matter what system they reside in.

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"While blacks are equitably represented in the district portion of mixed systems, they are abysmally underrepresented in the at-large portions."

Welch, Susan. The Impact of At-Large Elections on the Representation of Blacks and Hispanics. The Journal of Politics, Vol. 52, No. 4. (Nov. 1990).

"...few generalizations in political science appear to be as well verified as the proposition that at-large elections tend to be discriminatory toward Black Americans."

Engstrom, Richard and Michael McDonald. 1986. The Effect of At-Large versus District Elections on Racial Representation in U.S. Municipalities. In Electoral Laws and Their Political Consequences, ed. Bernard Grofman and Arend Lijphart. New York: Agathon.

"This Court has long recognized that multimember districts and at-large voting schemes may 'operate to minimize or cancel out the voting strength of racial [minorities in] the voting population.'" U.S. Supreme Court, in Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U.S. 30 (1986)