BRUCE K. COLE
‘Documentation is key’
Housing discrimination complaints were on the rise last year, according to a recently released federal report.
The report by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development revealed that the federal agency, along with state and local agencies, received 9,187 discrimination complaints during the last fiscal year, a 13 percent increase compared with the prior year. The agencies also settled more than 3,100 cases and provided over $11 million in monetary relief.
HUD attributed the increase in complaints to the agency’s education and outreach regarding housing discrimination.
But experts say the number of complaints is not a complete picture of discriminatory practices that are occurring nationwide. The National Fair Housing Alliance, which last week released the results of a two-year study that it conducted, estimates that millions of violations of the Fair Housing Act are committed each year.
“Generally the number of complaints always lags behind incidents [of discrimination],” said David J. Harris, executive director of the Fair Housing Center of Greater Boston. “Traditionally, there’s a big gap between complaints and incidents.”
Harris said research conducted by the Fair Housing Center of Greater Boston, which receives funding from HUD to enforce fair housing laws, help people file discrimination complaints and educate the public, indicates that most home-seekers don’t realize when they’re being subjected to discrimination. Past studies by the center have illustrated discrimination against blacks, Latinos, families with children and people with federal rental subsidies seeking housing in Greater Boston.
Federal fair housing laws prohibit housing discrimination on the basis of race, religion, national origin, sex, family status and disability.
In Massachusetts, the number of housing discrimination complaints filed has remained about the same in the last three years. Between 2002 and 2004, a total of 642 housing discrimination complaints were filed; 173 settlements were reached with 58 monetary awards totaling $328,685, according to Kristine Foye, spokeswoman for HUD’s New England regional office in Boston.
There were 214 complaints last year, a slight decrease from the 220 complaints received in 2003, but a little more than the 208 complaints filed in 2002. Last year there were 56 settlements, 21 with monetary awards totaling $90,884.
Nationally, the HUD report showed that out of the 9,187 complaints received during the last fiscal year, 38.2 percent alleged discrimination based on race, while another 37.9 percent were disability-related.
More than half of the complaints were about discrimination with the terms and conditions of a sale or rental, while 24 percent were about refusal to rent and 19.5 percent had to do with refusal to make a reasonable accommodation for a person with a disability.
About 10 percent of the total complaints, or 916, were from Hispanics alleging discrimination based on national origin. That represents a 31 percent increase from the previous year.
In the Greater Boston area, discrimination against Latinos is of particular concern. “We find high rates of discrimination against Latinos,” said Harris.
In a Fair Housing Center of Greater Boston study released nearly three years ago in which 50 pairs of Latino and white renters called landlords, real estate agents and property managers seeking apartments, the Latino renters were discriminated against in more than half of the test cases.
HUD has developed several outreach initiatives targeting Hispanics, including allocating $1.7 million to address discrimination against Hispanics in six states where that population is large and growing, as well as providing $850,000 over two years to groups with ties to the community to provide bilingual materials and services related to fair housing.
Greater outreach and education are critical to make both home-seekers and housing providers aware of their rights and responsibilities under the law, experts contend. “Our experience is that there is definitely a relationship between outreach and complaints,” said Harris.
‘Fear Factor’
Harris said more educational programs are particularly needed for housing providers. “We believe they [property owners and real estate agents] are the frontline defense against housing discrimination,” he said.
“Landlords do need more training. There’s no question about that,” acknowledged Bruce K. Cole, executive director of the Boston Rental Property Association.
Cole, whose organization provides support and training to landlords in Greater Boston, said much of the discrimination is based on “property owners’ fear of the unknown.” Many older owners, for example, keep units vacant because they’ve heard stories about tenants who destroy apartments or don’t pay rent, Cole said.
Those owners have never tried to figure out ways to prevent such worst-case scenarios, according to Cole. But Cole said landlords can protect themselves by doing tenant background checks, crafting good leases and inspecting rental units prior to tenants moving in.
“Documentation is key to helping them get over the fear factor,” said Cole.
“We find that the challenge for smaller landlords is that many times they don’t realize that they’re businesspeople. They feel it’s my home and it’s my prerogative who lives in the unit,” he said. “But the reality is, when you are a businessperson you can manage your property more effectively if you approach your interactions with a tenant in a more business-like way,” he said.
In addition to the discrimination cases settled by HUD and the local and state agencies, the agencies also found reasonable cause to believe that discrimination had occurred in 414 cases. HUD issued a charge of discrimination in an additional 43 complaints.
Four days after HUD released its report, the National Fair Housing Alliance, or NFHA, issued its study demonstrating that race, not economics, remains the determinant factor in where people live.
The alliance, a consortium of more than 120 private, nonprofit fair housing organizations and state and local civil rights groups, also announced that it had filed a race discrimination against Coldwell Banker Joe T. Lane Realty, a franchise in Jonesboro, Ga.
NFHA alleged that agents in the company “consistently and repeatedly” steered blacks away from neighborhoods that were predominantly white and discouraged whites from seeing or purchasing homes in integrated or majority black neighborhoods.
It also alleged that one particular agent at the Coldwell Banker franchise made numerous negative comments to white homebuyers about blacks and minority communities, saying things like: “People down here want to keep it how it is. Once blacks move in, then property values go down; it is impossible to sell your house.”
NFHA said it plans to file additional discrimination complaints against other real estate agencies throughout the year.
Using the report results as evidence that more resources are needed to battle housing discrimination, NFHA is urging the Bush administration to reinstate $4 million that was cut from the Fair Housing Initiatives Program. The group also wants Congress to appropriate $26 million for the program in fiscal year 2006.
Both the HUD and NFHA reports were released during the nation’s annual observance of Fair Housing Month and the 37th anniversary of signing of the Fair Housing Act.
Aglaia Pikounis may be reached at apikounis@thewarrengroup.com.
