A campaign to make Portland one of the first cities in the country to allow non-citizens to vote suffered a setback last night when the city's charter commission narrowly rejected the idea. But immigrants who converged on City Hall vowed to get the issue on the November ballot.

The commission charged with updating Portland's charter had spent months considering whether immigrants who are legal, tax-paying residents -- but not citizens -- should have the right to vote in municipal elections.

Over time, Commissioner Laurie Davis went from being ambivalent about extending voting rights to seeing it as an important expansion of suffrage. "Particularly in democracy, sharing the governance is really the core of what democracy is about," she said.

Others in favor of the measure argue that immigrants should have a say in who their local elected officials are. Home rule, they add, gives Portland the right to adopt such a measure.

But opponents say that legal challenges would plague the city. In the end, a proposal to put the issue on the November ballot was rejected, 7 to 5. Commissioner Thomas Valleau said there is already a way to get voting rights by becoming a citizen.

"And I know it takes three years or five years at the very minimum, and it can take longer than that. But there is a pathway, so whether or not this would be a great improvement, a great civic advance, I'm not entirely sure," Valleau said.

Immediately after the vote, murmurs went through the audience of more than 30 immigrants and their supporters. That prompted Commissioner Richard Ranaghan to turn to the chair, Pamela Plumb, and suggest that she explain what the commission had just done. "They understand, they understand," members of the audience responded.

Afterward, outside City Council chambers, some immigrants said they were angered by the comment and that it only steeled their resolve to press on with their campaign.

One of the leaders, Mohamed Dini, said the plan is to start collecting signatures to get the measure on the November ballot. "I guarantee you, we're coming back," Dini said.

Dini, a student at the University of Southern Maine, has been drumming up support for non-citizen voting among fellow members of the Somali community and other immigrants.

"We have many options. We understand the system. And they think immigrants are very stupid and don't understand anything at all," he says.

Will Everitt, state director of the League of Young Voters, which promotes youth activism, spoke with 21-year-old Shamso Ahmed and her friends about the petition drive.

Everitt: "In order to get it in front of the voters, we need to collect 5,100 signatures.
Woman: "OK, So will you help us get the petitions?"
Everitt: "We will help do that."
Woman: "OK, cool."

Ahmed said she and her friends would start collecting signatures this week, because many of them are on break from college.