Falls Church, DOJ Reach Agreement on Removing Voting Rights Act Preclearance from City

The U.S. Department of Justice and the City of Falls Church have reached an agreement to avoid the preclearance measure of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

David Bjerke, general registrar for the city, said he was notified Thursday about the agreement. The agreement goes into effect 30 days from last Thursday, Bjerke said.

With the agreement, the city could rearrange voting districts without first having to go through the DOJ. The DOJ checked the last 10 years of voter election results to determine if there was any proof of discrimination as part of the process to have the preclearance removed.

“As of Thursday, we no longer have to ask the DOJ for preclearance,” Bjerke said. “We still have to adhere to the rest of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, just not the preclearance.”

The city filed the lawsuit against the DOJ in February to have the preclearance removed so they would no longer have to get permission to make changes to their voter districts.

In 2011, city council voted to go from five voting districts to three. In the same year, city residents voted on a referendum to move their elections to November from May.

Signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the act contained special enforcement provisions targeted at those areas of the country where Congress believed the potential for discrimination to be the greatest, according to the Department of Justice website.