City Councilor Felix Arroyo shuffled into City Hall yesterday, his fiancee at his side and resignation audible in his voice. He shook hands with colleagues wishing him well and city workers expressing sorrow for his election loss Tuesday.
"Hey, we keep going," Arroyo said to one. "Estamos continuando," his fiancee repeated in Spanish as they rode an elevator to his fifth-floor office.
Arroyo, the city's first and only Latino councilor, lost his seat amid Boston's lowest voter turnout in any municipal race in at least two decades. It was a massive blow to the city's Latino community, which had grown to count on him as their voice in city government.
"We have to understand now that the city is facing huge increases in foreclosures, huge in creases in crime, huge increases in dropout rates, and you're talking about a city that's 50 percent people of color," said Giovanna Negretti, executive director of Oiste, a statewide Latino political group. "To have lost one of the strongest voices that represents the very communities that are affected by these issues is devastating."
The loss was compounded by the performance of Latino candidates in Lawrence, who narrowly missed an opportunity to seize the majority of a City Council for the first time in the state's history.
"It was a sad day," said Gloribell Mota, an aide to Arroyo and protegee who lost a bid in September for a state representative seat in East Boston. "Definitely yesterday was a big indicator of a lot of work that needs to be done. This is not the trend we wanted nor that we anticipated."
In Boston, the election appeared to stop in its tracks a five-year trend of increasing voter turnout among the city's nonwhite communities, which contributed to the successes of such candidates as Suffolk Sheriff Andrea Cabral, City Councilor Sam Yoon, and Governor Deval Patrick.
Voter turnout in predominantly Latino precincts Tuesday was 60 percent less than in 2003, when voters last went to the polls to elect a City Council without also casting ballots for mayor, according to an analysis by MassVOTE. Turnout in black precincts was down 58 percent from 2003 and off by 40 percent in Asian precincts, the analysis shows. In predominantly white precincts, the dropoff was 36 percent.
"This is a huge wake-up call," said Avi Green, executive director of MassVOTE.
As voting advocacy groups and Latino community leaders came to terms with the backslide yesterday, they said several factors were at work. In addition to the nasty weather that kept many voters at home, for the first time in city history there was no preliminary election to gauge where Arroyo stood; in 2003 he placed fifth in the preliminary, but voters rallied to push him onto the council in the general election.
"That really kicked the minority community in the head," said Joyce Ferriabough-Bolling, a longtime political strategist whose husband, Bruce Bolling, was Boston's first elected black City Council president.
Much of the onus, though, may lie with the candidate. Arroyo said yesterday that he had fewer campaign workers, less money, and was much less organized than in previous campaigns. He also admits he has been a little distracted.
"I'm in love," he said. "Love distracts you."
Arroyo's fiancee, Selene Acosta, a gregarious woman from Venezuela, volunteered during his 2003 campaign and accompanied him on many campaign appearances this year.
While other candidates asked attendees for their votes, he was sometimes inviting them to his wedding.
"GREAT NEWS!" his campaign website announces. "Selene and I are going to get married next spring and you are invited to our picnic celebration by the Charles River!"
His grown children, who played integral roles in previous campaigns, were not as visible this time. They haven't been since Arroyo, 60, split with their mother and started seeing Acosta.
"It's very painful," Arroyo said, sitting in his office, where a framed photograph shows Arroyo laughing with President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela.
Voter-mobilization groups say they were out in full force Tuesday but couldn't pull off the higher turnout of recent years without Arroyo's full attention.
"People can do a lot of door-knocking, but if there aren't compelling campaigns on local issues and candidates asking people for their votes, then they're not going to respond," Green said.
Green and others are now looking at potential up-and-coming candidates to restore Latino representation on the council and win other elected offices. They point to people like Mota, Negretti, Sonia Chang-Díaz, who nearly unseated state Senator Dianne Wilkerson last year, Carlos Henriquez, who lost a bid this week to unseat district Councilor Chuck Turner, Arroyo aide Calvin Feliciano, and Arroyo's son Felix G. Arroyo.
In Lawrence, the city with the highest proportion of Latinos in the state, a majority of the city's voters were Latino for the first time, and eight Latinos were among 18 vying for nine City Council seats. But only four Latino candidates won.
"We had the votes . . . but turnout was low," said Isabel Melendez, a longtime community activist and radio show host. "We have to educate people more."
Chelsea, which is nearly 50 percent Latino, faced a different challenge: getting Latino candidates to run.
Three Latino candidates ran for seats on the 11-member City Council, and two won.
"It's not as though people are not voting for Latino candidates," said City Manager Jay Ash.
Carol Hardy-Fanta, co-editor of "Latino Politics in Massachusetts: Struggles, Strategies and Prospects," said Arroyo's loss and the low number of Latino officials in Chelsea and Lawrence are troubling.
"To have no Latino representation on the governing body of the City of Boston in 2007 is unconscionable," said Hardy-Fanta, director of the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts at Boston.
Statewide, she added, "the time has come to gain their full share of representation. Communities need to come up with a way to make sure that happens."
Matt Viser of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Donovan Slack can be reached at dslack@globe.com, Sacchetti at msacchetti@globe.com.
