Denver Fair Housing Audit Reveals 'Pervasive' Discrimination

The Denver Metro Fair Housing Center (DMFHC) yesterday released the findings of its audit into fair housing practices, in a report entitled “Access Denied: A Report on Rental Housing Discrimination in the Denver Metro Area.”

The DMFHC's report is based on testing conducted in late 2013, in which white prospects were paired with black or Latino testers, and testers without children were paired with testers with children.

According to the report, apartment hunters are likely to encounter discrimination 91% of the time if they are Latino and 67% of the time if they are black. Also, a bias against families with children was present 73% of the time. DMFHC Executive Director Arturo Alvarado said the audit's “dramatic results" reveal that fair housing compliance "is a pervasive problem in our community and that our public officials must take action now to enforce fair housing laws and publicly condemn housing discrimination.”

Although this audit focused on race, national origin, and familial status, three of the seven protected classes under the Fair Housing Act, the report also cautions against noncompliance with other protected classes under federal as well as state housing discrimination laws.

For example, in its recommendations, the report advises housing providers to implement non-discriminatory policies, noting that:

One example of a policy that is unlawful under state law is an application fee discount offered to married couples only. Because marital status and sexual orientation are protected classes in Colorado, providing a discount to married people that is not available to singles or unmarried couples is an example of discrimination in terms, conditions, or privileges of rental.

You can download the full report here.

Testers Show Ohio Landlord Didn't Make the Grade

The Ohio Civil Rights Commission yesterday ordered the landlord of an apartment building in Conneaut, Ohio, to pay over $11,000 in damages, attorney's fees, and travel costs for a complaint alleging violations of the FHA and state fair housing law's ban on discrimination based on familial status and disability.

According to a report from The Columbus Dispatch, the landlord:

• told testers who claimed to need service animals for a disability either that all animals aren't allowed under any circumstances, or that keeping an animal for a disability would require a specific deposit; and


• told a tester who posed as a single mother with a child that she can only rent a downstairs apartment at a higher cost (a practice commonly known as "steering").

Interestingly, the only allegations at issue were discriminatory acts committed against testers. Unlike actual victims, testers only pretend to be looking for an apartment while checking for fair housing compliance.

(Learn more about steering by reading "Fair Housing Help: Identify and Avoid Illegal Steering" and get more information about the role of testers by reading "Landlording in a World of Fair Housing Testing.")

Was this a fair outcome? Should the fact that the complaint stemmed from allegations based solely on testing play a role in determining liability or the amount of damages?

What do you think?

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Landlord Puts No-Pets Policy Above the Law

Many landlords have a no-pets policy at their properties, or they have rules limiting the types of pets allowed. This is perfect legal. However, what many landlords don't know is that they must let tenants keep service animals in their apartments when needed as a reasonable accommodation for a disability. This means their policy is still valid, but they should be prepared to make an exception, if warranted, to comply with the Fair Housing Act's (FHA) ban against disability-based discrimination.

Landlords who aren't familiar with the FHA's reasonable accommodations requirement or who don't understand how it may affect their pet policy often go head-to-head with prospects and tenants, insisting on what they believe are their rights while getting themselves deeper into fair housing trouble.

A recent example shows how this plays out.

The owner and manager of a trailer park in Lakeland, Washington advertised apartments with a no-pets policy. A local non-profit fair housing organization sent testers posing as prospects who need service dogs for a disability respond to the ad. More than once, the owner told the testers no dogs are allowed. After the testers explained the dogs were service animals and needed a reasonable accommodation, the owner and manager still refused. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) Charge of Discrimination, the manager argued that "if one tenant has an animal everyone will want one" and also expressed concern that animals will destroy the property.

The owner and manager will now have a chance to argue their case in from of a HUD administrative law judge.

Anti-Black Doesn't Always Mean Pro-White

Most of the time, race discrimination cases under the Fair Housing Act (FHA) center around a landlord or property manager who allegedly favors white tenants above all others. But a new Charge of Discrimination announced July 21 by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) against a Cincinnati, Ohio landlord and property manager shows this doesn't have to be the case.

According to the complaint, testers collected evidence that the landlord and property manager tried to make their 63-unit building become less black and more Hispanic. To do this, they allegedly set up appointments to view available apartments with Hispanic prospective tenants while coming up with various excuses for not letting black prospects view them.

The Charge asks a HUD administrative law judge to assess a $32,000 combined penalty against the landlord and property manager, plus award compensatory and other damages.

Update: Washington Complex Owners and Managers Settle Multiple Claims With DOJ

Last April, as part of a special series to commemorate Fair Housing Month, I blogged about the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) first announced charge of Fair Housing Month. The case concerned a Renton, Washington landlord, property management company, and on-site manger who had to defend themselves against alleged violations of four of the Fair Housing Act's (FHA) seven protected classes: race, color, national origin, and familial status.

Since then, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) got involved, and the defendants have now agreed to settle the claims against them, while not admitting any liability or wrongdoing.

On March 8, 2011, a federal court entered a consent order that requires the defendants to pay $85,000 to tenants and prospective tenants who were harmed by the alleged discriminatory practices, pay $25,000 to the government as a civil penalty, create a common recreational area for tenants, including children, provide fair housing training to the defendants' employees, and develop and maintain non-discrimination policies throughout the complex.

Discrimination Against Unmarried Couples?

Can a landlord legally discriminate against two prospective tenants because they're not married? Not if they're in Michigan.

Michigan is one of a handful of states that protect against marital status discrimination in housing. According to the Fair Housing Center of West Michigan (FHC), testers posing as unmarried couples inquired over a one-year period about renting from landlords who own 14 condos and eight apartments. But the landlords allegedly told the testers that they would rent the units only to single people or married couples.

The landlords have agreed to pay $60,000 to the FHC to settle the discrimination claims, according to a report from the Associated Press.

If you're wondering whether marital status is protected in your state, check out the Protected Classes Tool at fairhousingresources.com or my article on About.com, entitled "Does Your State Fair Housing Law Have Any Additional Protected Classes?"

Artifice Forces Landlord's Hand on Renting to Families With Children

A man called the managers of an Outagamie County, Wisconsin apartment he saw advertised to inquire about its availability. Apparently, after the man told one of the managers that he and his wife had children, she allegedly refused to show him the apartment.

Acting on suspicion, the man's wife decided also to call the manager about seeing the apartment, but making a point to say (inaccurately) that she and her husband had no children. Not only did the manager immediately schedule a showing, but she pressured her to see the available apartment right away, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

Further testing by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Fair Housing Council uncovered more evidence of discrimination based on familial status, which is illegal under the Fair Housing Act (FHA). For example, the manager reportedly told one tester that she's "looking for the perfect renter, meaning I don't want a lot of kids" and that she charges families with children a higher security deposit.

All this led HUD to issue a Charge of Discrimination, announced October 21, against the managers and the owner, meaning they'll need to defend themselves against alleged Fair Housing Act violations before an administrative law judge.

Being White Was Not an Issue in This Ohio Race Case

Most of the time, housing discrimination cases based on race involve complainants who believe they were treated differently because they're not white. But a recently announced Ohio case reminds us that the Fair Housing Act isn't so limiting; this particular dispute actually arose because the complainants aren't black.

According to a recent press release from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), owners of a three-bedroom house in Warrensville, Ohio allegedly discouraged an Hispanic prospect — as well as a fair housing tester — from renting after asking her why she would "want to live in a black neighborhood." The owners, who are black, explained they've had "problems" renting to tenants of other races, and eventually rented the house to a black family.

The owners will now have to defend themselves against a discrimination charge before a HUD administrative law judge.

Preferences Are Troublesome, Even if Implied

Apartment advertisements can run afoul of the Fair Housing Act (FHA) if they show a preference for a certain type of tenant — even if that preference is implied.

A Buffalo, New York landlord just learned this lesson after placing a Craigslist ad for an apartment in a "nice Irish neighborhood." He didn't write "Irish only" (clear discrimination) or "Irish preferred" (direct preferential discrimination), but his decision to use the language he did implies he would give tenants of a certain national origin, people of Irish descent, favorable treatment. Stated differently, people reading the ad who aren't of Irish descent may feel discouraged from applying, expecting that they wouldn't be welcome.

According to a report today from The Buffalo News, the landlord, without admitting liability, signed a settlement agreement with the New York State Division of Human Rights agreeing to pay $1,000 for the alleged bias in his ad.

Interesting to note:

• While under investigation for the offending ad, the landlord reportedly made discriminatory statements to testers in violation of the FHA's ban on race and familial-status discrimination. One white tester claims the landlord told her "there are no coloreds here... I hope your husband isn't black," and two testers reported that the landlord asked about their children.

Fair Housing Month: First Announced HUD Charge Covers Most FHA Protected Classes

Yesterday, I blogged about how the Fair Housing Act (FHA) protects people against housing discrimination based on seven so-called "protected classes." In the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) first announced charge of Fair Housing Month, a King County, Washington landlord, property management company, and on-site manger will face an administrative law judge to defend themselves against alleged violations of four of the FHA's seven protected classes: race, color, national origin, and familial status.

According to HUD's Charge of Discrimination, issued on April 1 and announced on April 6, the owners and managers allegedly engaged in a pattern of unfair treatment of blacks, Hispanics, Asian-Americans, and families with children at their five-building apartment complex in Renton.

Testers at the property allegedly revealed that the manager:

• offered the same apartment at a higher rent to black and Hispanic testers than to a white tester;
• offered earlier availability dates and apartments with newer amenities to white testers as compared to black testers;
• asked Hispanic applicants if they illegally purchased Social Security cards or green cards;
• made several discriminatory statements to minority testers, including telling a black tester that she wouldn't tolerate loud parties or "weed smoking on the balcony" and that he was "one of the good ones" because he wears his pants "up on his buttocks";
• said that children couldn't play ball, skateboard, or ride bicycles on the complex's grounds and would need to go to a park.

HUD's investigation also allegedly found evidence that the manager:

• directed her staff to show minority applicants apartments with less desirable amenities, such as older carpet, countertops, and appliances;
• steered minority applicants away from the building in which she lived;
• banned her assistant from speaking Spanish to Hispanic applicants, saying, "No, no, no. None of that sh*t. We speak English here";
• told one Asian-American tenant to "go back to India" if he can't use the appliances properly and said to another, "For God's sake, you come from a country with no running water and cook over an open flame."

Return tomorrow for the ninth part of this special "Fair Housing Month" feature at Fairhousingblog.com.

Tell HUD What You Think About LGBT Discrimination

You may recall reading my February 27, 2010 blog post about the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's (HUD) new plans to collect data on the state of sexual orientation discrimination across the United States. With a goal of determining who would make good testers for LGBT discrimination, HUD decided an effective starting point would be to get input from people living in Chicago, New York, and San Francisco — cities that currently ban discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Following recent town hall meetings in these three cities, HUD has announced it's now soliciting feedback from people across the United States on its LGBT discrimination study. If you have ideas on what a tester should do to signal to a landlord that the individual or a couple is LGBT, HUD wants to hear about it.

You can send HUD a comment through its online suggestion box on LGBT discrimination.

HUD Asks Chicago, New York, and San Francisco for LGBT Testing Ideas

When an agency wants to send fair housing testers to a property, it's usually easy to pick suitable people to fill the role. For instance, to test for racial discrimination, agencies send white and minority testers and then compare their notes. If it's disability discrimination at issue, testers with and without a noticeable disability are dispatched to check for bias.

But what about finding appropriate people to test for discrimination based on sexual orientation? Because sexual orientation isn't one of the Fair Housing Act (FHA)'s protected classes, testing for this type of discrimination hasn't been performed by a federal agency, and no organization to date has attempted to test for sexual orientation discrimination in housing on a national scale.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) wants to change that, having recently announced plans to collect data on the state of sexual orientation discrimination across the United States. According to a report from BusinessWeek, HUD will first seek input from people living in Chicago, New York, and San Francisco — three cities that currently ban discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity — to help determine who would make good testers, what they should say, and how they should act to get landlords to express their bias, if any exists.

What's your advice to HUD? How can testers for sexual orientation discrimination be most effective? Also, do you think such a housing study is long overdue, or is it an unnecessary expenditure of taxpayer money?

What do you think?

New Funding Announcement Puts FHIP in Spotlight

When reading about fair housing enforcement, you've probably come across the term "FHIP" but may not know exactly what it means. These letters stand for the Fair Housing Initiatives Program, which was established by the Housing and Community Development Act of 1987, as amended by the Housing and Community Development Act of 1992.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced on January 21 that it awarded $26.3 million under the FHIP to 98 fair housing organizations and other non-profit agencies in 37 states and the District of Columbia.

What's all this money used for?

HUD funds fair housing organizations and other non-profits through the FHIP to provide direct assistance to people who believe they've been the victims of Fair Housing Act (FHA) violations. The recipient organizations help people identify government agencies that handle complaints of housing discrimination, and conduct preliminary investigation of claims (including sending testers to the properties in question).

In addition, the FHIP promotes fair housing laws and equal opportunity awareness through four initiatives. One of the initiatives, the Administrative Enforcement Initiative (AEI), helps state and local governments that administer laws similar to the FHA establish projects that broaden an agency's range of enforcement and compliance activities. According to HUD, there are currently no funds available for the AEI initiative.

The other three initiatives provide funds and competitive grants to organizations that qualify:

1. The Fair Housing Organizations Initiative (FHOI). The FHOI provides funds to help non-profit fair housing organizations handle fair housing enforcement and education initiatives more effectively. HUD recently announced that it awarded $21.1 million in grants under the FHOI this year.
   
   
2. The Private Enforcement Initiative (PEI). The PEI offers a range of assistance to the nationwide network of fair housing groups. This initiative funds non-profit fair housing organizations to carry out testing and enforcement activities to prevent or eliminate discriminatory housing practices. HUD recently announced that it awarded $3.1 million in grants under the PEI this year.
   
   
3. The Education and Outreach Initiative (EOI). The EOI provides funding to state and local government agencies and non-profit organizations for initiatives that bring awareness and understanding to equal opportunity in housing means and that increase housing providers' familiarity with FHA compliance. HUD recently announced that it awarded $2.1 million in grants under the EOI this year.

Do you think the FHIP funds go to a worthy cause? Is $26.3 million too much or too little?

What do you think?

Landlording in a World of Fair Housing Testing

Government and fair housing agencies across the United States have been using so-called "testers" for years to help craft compelling cases of housing discrimination.

Testers are people who call or visit properties to inquire about vacancies. They pretend to be genuinely interested in renting or buying them, but their true, secret purpose is to determine whether a property owner or manager is complying with fair housing laws.

Fair housing testing programs have proven effective at gathering evidence because their targets don't realize they're under investigation and therefore often have their guard down (and their mouth open).

For a good example of how much testers can help a case, you needn't look far into the past. A complaint filed November 23, 2009 by the Department of Justice (DOJ) against an Illinois landlord for discrimination based on race and color shows the type of useful evidence testers can obtain.

According to the complaint, the Illinois landlord allegedly refused to rent a single-family house in a Chicago suburb to a black couple because of their race. The couple suspected race as a factor because after they arrived to look at the property, the landlord was quick to tell them he just rented the house to a white prospect. The landlord also insisted that the couple wouldn't be interested in his other vacancy.

The next day, the wife decided to call the landlord to ask the status of the property they had just visited, without identifying herself. When the landlord told her it was available, this confirmed the couple's suspicions and led them to pursue a fair housing claim.

A local fair housing agency and the DOJ each dispatched testers to contact the landlord in the hope of gathering more evidence to bolster their discrimination case against him.

Here's what the testing produced, according to the complaint:

• The landlord didn't return a phone call from a black tester inquiring about the house.



• The landlord separately told two white testers that the house was available and invited them to see it. While showing the property to each of the white testers, the landlord: a) asked the tester if her husband was black (to which each one said no); b) told the tester about problems he had after unknowingly renting the house to an interracial couple; c) made various statements against renting to black tenants; and d) claimed to have rejected a black prospect's offer to rent the house at the advertised rent with paying a year's worth of rent upfront. The also landlord told one of the white testers that several black people inquired about the house, and he offered a discounted rent to the other tester because she was white.

If there's a landlording lesson to be learned or advice to be gleaned from this type of story, it's this:

Treat all prospects as if they're testers.

Sure, doing so is smart because it means not helping the government build a case against you. But, more importantly and proactively, if landlords require staff not only to get fair housing training but to keep fair housing concerns in mind when interacting with prospects, they'll be much less likely to say or do something that could lead — fairly or unfairly — to accusations of discrimination.

Interesting to note:

• The Department of Justice (DOJ) launched its testing program in 1992. Since then, the DOJ has recruited and trained over 1,000 employees to pose as testers.

Looking for Discrimination in All the Wrong Places

The Iowa Civil Rights Commission was happy to announce last week that its search for evidence of familial status discrimination came up empty.

After randomly selecting and then reviewing online and newspaper advertisements for properties in six communities within the state, the Commission interviewed by phone the 35 property owners and managers behind the ads and found that they didn't exclude families with children.

This report builds on two studies the Commission performed in 2008. The first study found that fewer than 1% of 9,646 housing advertisements were likely discriminatory, with 90% of those based on familial status. The second study tested familial status discrimination in Waterloo and found two possible instances (as well as five possible instances of racial steering).

The Commission now plans to turn its attention to testing for other types of discrimination under the Fair Housing Act and state law, including discrimination based on race, national origin, and disability.

Racism Again Proves Costly As a Marketing Strategy

If having no black tenants at your apartment complex is your selling point, fire your marketer. That's the message the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is sending to landlords by going after the owners and operators of a Davie, Florida apartment complex for refusing to rent to black people — and boasting about their policy to prospective white tenants.

Sound familiar? That's because the same type of racial marketing strategy was allegedly recently employed at an apartment complex in Alabama, leading the DOJ to file a fair housing complaint against the complex's owner, manager, and maintenance employee (see "Using Racism to Rent Apartments," July 24, 2009).

The owners and operators of the Florida complex have agreed to settle, in light of evidence gathered by DOJ testers that indicate the complex violated the Fair Housing Act (FHA) by:

• Directing the property managers not to rent to applicants who even "appear" to be black;
• Telling white applicants that an advantage of living at the complex is its lack of black tenants;
• Encouraging white prospects to apply for an apartment while discouraging black prospects from doing the same;
• Offering to waive costs such as the application fee only for white prospects.

Under the August 27, 2009 Consent Decree, the complex must pay $115,000 to identified "aggrieved persons," plus up to $25,000 in compensation to additional discrimination victims who still may come forward — as well as a $74,000 civil penalty. The complex has also agreed to have its employees undergo fair housing training and take other steps to prevent violations in the future.

What Would the Neighbors Think?

Here's a case that shows you needn't prove a person is a racist in order to successfully claim that he violated the Fair Housing Act's (FHA) ban on racial discrimination.

A New York City landlord allegedly refused to rent to people who weren't white because, he claimed, the neighborhood was white and that's the way everyone wanted it.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently charged this landlord (and his brother, the co-owner) with discrimination based on race, color, and national origin, on behalf of two fair housing agencies, the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA) and Long Island Housing Services Inc. (LIHS). According to the Charge, when each of these agencies sent minority testers to inquire about vacancies, the landlord repeatedly asked about their racial and ethnic background and made discriminatory statements. For example, the landlord offered what he thought was good justification for his anti-white bias, explaining that renting to a black person would lead to neighbors' complaints.

A HUD administrative law judge will hear the case.

Is the landlord's justification — that he's bound by the neighborhood's supposed desires and prejudices — valid? Or, do you think the landlord's is clearly illegal, given that his statements restrict housing choices, and that his reasoning runs counter to the policy behind the FHA itself?

What do you think?

Using Racism to Rent Apartments

The folks at a Clanton, Alabama apartment complex thought they had an effective marketing campaign going. It appears they made efforts to add something they considered desirable to their complex, then used it to promote the complex to prospective tenants. What they probably didn't consider is that if that "something" is related to racism, there's a good chance the federal government will notice and take action.

Sure enough, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) this week announced it's suing the owner, manager, and maintenance employee of the nine-building, 72-apartment complex for a pattern or practice of violating the Fair Housing Act's (FHA) ban on discrimination based on race and color.

Through the use of testing (sending people to apartment complexes to check for fair housing compliance while posing as prospective tenants), the DOJ allegedly uncovered evidence that the complex:

• adopted rental policies to discourage black people from becoming tenants; and


• used the fact that no tenants at the complex were black as a selling point to market the apartments to white tenants.

The DOJ in its complaint seeks damages, a civil penalty, and an order to prevent continued discrimination at the complex.

Another Study Shows Voice Profiling's Prevalence

In October, I wrote about the results of a survey conducted by a fair housing advocacy agency in Marin County, California, which showed that black testers (posing as prospects) were often treated less favorably than white testers under similar circumstances.

On Tuesday, The Fair Housing Council of Suburban Philadelphia (FHCSP) released a report, entitled "FHCSP Testing Audit: Housing Discrimination Trends in the Philadelphia Region," which includes an analysis of its own Voice Profiling Project, in which black and white testers posing as prospects contacted landlords and realtors in the Philadelphia area between 2006 and 2008.

The results show that voice profiling occurred at least 54% of the time, with some black testers being asked to pay higher security deposits and application fees, not being told about certain vacancies, and not being told about any apartment discounts. In 23% of the tests, black testers received inferior service, such as not getting their calls returned or being given the opportunity to learn more about available apartments.

Do you think these surveys imply that voice profiling is prevalent across the United States, or is it limited to certain communities? Can you ever guess someone's race based only on the person's voice over the phone? Can most landlords?

What do you think?

DOJ Issues Year-End Report on Fair Housing Enforcement

The Department of Justice (DOJ) this month released a "written statement" to report on its efforts in combating housing discrimination across the United States. The report noted several achievements:

• In fiscal years 2007 and 2008, the DOJ obtained settlements and judgments in fair housing and fair lending cases requiring the payment of a total of up to $12 million in monetary damages to victims of discrimination and civil penalties to the government.
  
  
• In fiscal year 2008, 39% of the DOJ's total cases and 45% of its pattern or practice cases alleged race discrimination.
  
  
• In fiscal year 2008, the DOJ conducted more than 600 paired tests, exceeding by almost 25% the number of tests conducted in fiscal year 2007, which in turn significantly exceeded the next highest number of tests conducted in any previous year since the inception of the DOJ's new testing program.

The statement, however, concluded on a more cautiously optimistic note:

In sum, the Division has contributed a great deal to the fight against housing and lending discrimination in this nation. Yet there remains much work to be done, and we will continue to dedicate our energy and resources to exposing and eliminating discriminatory housing and lending practices.

Let's see what 2009 will bring...