Voters in District B elected Tarsha Jackson to Houston City Council on Saturday, after a slow-moving legal battle kept the race off the ballot for an entire year.
While 15 out of 16 council members were elected in 2019, District B residents waited for their chance to vote.
Jackson is a long-time advocate for criminal justice reform who started organizing after her son was arrested and jailed on a class C misdemeanor in his special needs class. With 68.5% of the vote in the runoff election, Jackson beat challenger Cynthia Bailey.
Bailey runs a nonprofit for local kids, and has spent years cleaning up illegal dumping in the district.
More than a decade ago, Bailey was convicted of theft. In the protracted legal challenge that kept the runoff race off the ballot, the third-place finisher in the general election sued the City of Houston and Harris County, arguing that Bailey was ineligible to run because of a felony conviction.
Ultimately, courts cleared the way for Bailey to run.
District B’s term-limited incumbent Council Member Jerry Davis served an additional year on council to represent the district during the election court challenges.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?creatorScreenName=houstonpubmedia&dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1337953035839016961&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.houstonpublicmedia.org%2Farticles%2Fnews%2Fhouston%2F2020%2F12%2F13%2F387726%2Ftarsha-jackson-wins-long-delayed-houston-city-council-runoff-election%2F&partner=tfwp&siteScreenName=houstonpubmedia&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550px
Jackson is a former Harris County director of the progressive group the Texas Organizing Project.
“We are absolutely thrilled at the prospects of her being a powerful voice for the people at City Hall, a policymaker not afraid to ruffle the feathers of the status quo and win the changes our Black and Latino communities deserve,” read a statement from Brianna Brown, TOP deputy director.
Jackson is expected to be sworn in around Dec. 21, after the runoff election results are finalized.