Atascadero Unified School District (AUSD) is facing a lawsuit that seeks to overturn its at-large election system, alleging the method dilutes Latino voting power and violates the California Voting Rights Act.
The lawsuit, filed May 8 in San Luis Obispo Superior Court on behalf of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project, argues that the way that school board members are currently elected prevents Latino residents from “electing candidates of their choice or influencing the outcome” of school board elections.
It was brought by Malibu attorney Kevin Shenkman, a lawyer who has sued or threatened legal action against at least 175 cities, school districts, and local agencies across California under the state’s voting rights law.
Shenkman has pursued similar actions locally, including against the cities of San Luis Obispo and Grover Beach and the Paso Robles Joint Unified School District.
The complaint alleges that the district’s at-large election system—in which voters across the entire district elect all members of the board of trustees—has resulted in Latino candidates consistently losing elections.
“The effects of AUSD’s at-large method of election are apparent and compelling,” the complaint states, without providing specific detail.
The filing cites census data estimating that Latino residents make up approximately 27.4 percent of the district’s population. It alleges that despite this, “candidates preferred by Latino voters, particularly those candidates who are Latino themselves, consistently lose in elections within AUSD,” and that “no Latinos have been elected to AUSD’s governing board in recent elections.”
According to the results of recent election cycles, a Latino candidate hasn’t run for school board in Atascadero either.
The Southwest Voter Registration Education Project, the plaintiff organization, is described in the filing as a Latino voter participation group founded in 1974. According to its website, the organization has registered more than 3 million Latino voters and been involved in 210 voting rights lawsuits.
The filing also alleges that the AUSD previously acknowledged the potential need to change its election method. According to the complaint, the district adopted a resolution in November 2021 indicating an intent to transition toward trustee-area elections “to bring its elections into compliance” with the California Voting Rights Act but later abandoned that effort.
New Times reached out to the AUSD but did not receive comment before publication.
In 2022, Paso Robles Unified faced a comparable challenge under the same law and from the same attorney, ultimately moving away from at-large elections after legal pressure. The district later adopted trustee-area elections, dividing the school board into geographic areas.
More recently, negotiations involving the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project and Shenkman led to changes in San Luis Obispo’s City Council election system. Beginning in November 2026, SLO voters will shift from a vote-for-two model to a vote-for-one model, in which each voter casts a single vote for City Council and the two highest vote-getters win seats. The system remains at-large.
The change followed years of discussions that began in 2023, when the organization demanded that the city consider creating voting districts to address concerns about minority vote dilution. The city ultimately concluded a district system would not improve Latino voting power in San Luis Obispo, where demographic data showed Latino voters were not geographically concentrated.
The agreement also included a $75,000 payment in attorney’s fees to the organization for negotiations, along with additional funding tied to voter education and outreach efforts.
AUSD discussed the litigation in closed session on May 19, according to the meeting agenda.
New Times reached out to Shenkman but did not receive comment before publication. ∆
This article appears in May 21-28, 2026.