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CIVIC ENGAGEMENT 250 Moving from Exclusion to Belonging or three immigrants ran for the school board all at the same time. The candidates did not really have the knowledge or language skills to be effective. It came through at the public forum and no one was elected.”1230 In other cases, potential immigrant representatives may be reluctant to run because, according to one activist, they “are nervous about the commitment because they would get a lot of calls as the ‘diverse’ person, as well as getting lots of calls from their own community for help with everything.”1231 Recently, immigrant candidates have had more success winning elections, through some combination of increased voter turnout in immigrant communities and structural changes to election processes. In Minneapolis, three immigrant candidates were elected to city council after a number of electoral changes, including redistricting and ranked choice voting, both of which may have contributed to the new diversity in city government. Outside of voting and running for office, immigrants can also participate in the political process by holding unelected positions on government boards and commissions. Here, too, immigrants are not well represented. One immigrant reported on her city’s efforts: “The human relations commission has one Latino. They are not very involved, not very organized….This is the city’s attempt at outreach, there is no other attempt.”1232 In some cases, the law prevents a deliberate effort to increase board and commission diversity: “Decisions are made by the mayor and council. The law prohibits choosing candidates for the commissions based on race, which makes it very difficult. You can’t even indicate race on the application.”1233 Even though this law may have been passed with an intention to prohibit racism and facilitate minority participation, it now has the opposite effect. In other cities, simple policy changes have made it easier for a diverse group of people to become involved in boards and commissions. One government official described how his city changed its process for filling commission vacancies: “We used to fill openings on city commissions as they arose, but it was hard to do adequate publicity each time and so only people in the know would apply. We centralized it to one time during the year and offered a diverse range of positions. The effect has been pretty subtle but it increased the number of applicants.”1234 1230 Interview 64. 1231 Interview 64. 1232 Interview 86. 1233 Interview 128. 1234 Interview 58. The word ‘political’ is already intimidating to most. They stay away because they may not know how to participate and they would be afraid to participate.”