March 2024 - Fair Housing History
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Welcome Note
In honor of April being Fair Housing Month, we thought we’d dedicate this issue to introducing the history of Fair Housing and present all the Fair Housing Month activities we’ll be engaged in throughout the upcoming month!!
Did You Know…
In the early decades of the 20th century, thousands of African Americans moved north. They left behind homes in the rural South to seek jobs in rapidly industrializing Northern cities like Chicago, New York, Detroit, and Cleveland. As the Great Migration continued, local governments, white landlords, and real estate agents responded to growing numbers of black residents by adopting strategies to create racially segregated neighborhoods. (1)
“Redlining” of neighborhoods, one of a number of explicitly racist United States federal housing policies in the mid–twentieth century, blocked Black households and other communities of color from accessing home mortgages—and as a result homeownership—for decades. (2)
On April 11, 1968, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968, which included Fair Housing protections and was meant as a follow-up to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This came just one week after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who had played an integral role in the 1966 open housing marches in Chicago. (3)
The Fair Housing Act has been amended over the years to include 7 protected classes: Race, Color, Religion, National Origin, Sex, Disability, and Families with Children.
In 2021, the Bostock v. Clayton County employment discrimination case reexamined how federal agencies enforce Sex based discrimination to include Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity in laws such as the Fair Housing Act.
So What Does It All Mean?
The Fair Housing Act and fair housing movements are alive and active. The Act itself has grown and continues to grow to respond to continued discrimination against vulnerable peoples.
Bad actors continue to this day, even though for nearly six decades, it has been unlawful to discriminate in housing.
In 2022, there were 33,007 fair housing complaints filed, the most in any single year since the Act became law. (4)
What Can We Do?
Educate and inform both tenants and housing providers of the rights and protections afforded by the Fair Housing Act.
Remember, laws alone don’t change behavior. Share your stories and experiences so that others can see and feel the real life impact that discrimination can have on people and communities.
Speak up! If you or someone you know is experiencing housing discrimination, let us know. Enduring discrimination is not a remedy, but pushing back and exercising one’s rights is the path to a greater realization of equity and equality in housing.
Community Outreach
Upcoming Outreach Events
March 30 - Orlando Pride Center’s Trans Day of Visibility
April 2 - Apartment Association of Greater Orlando Fair Housing Training
April 3 - Flagler Cares Community Resource Help Night
April 10 - Deland Family Fun Day
April 15 - Crescent City Family Day
April 17 - City of Orlando Fair Housing Month Event
April 17 - Apopka Farmworkers Office Community Office Hours
April 23 - Free Grocery Store and FLS Food Justice Workshop
April 23 - May 28 - Tuesday afternoons Fair Housing Training series (online)
April 26 - Flagler County Spring Outreach Resource Event
April 26 - Pierson Latino Outreach Night
What We’ve Been Up To
March 2nd - Partnership for Strong Families’ Brunch and Learn
We got the chance to present with our eviction prevention team for families at the Partnership for Strong Families Library Partnership branch. It was a great opportunity to talk about all the ways Eviction Prevention and Fair Housing projects work together to ensure safe housing for Alachua County residents.
March 6- Flagler/ Volusia County: Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Summit and Resource Sharing Event
March 18 - UF HealthStreet Presentation: Our Outreach Coordinator presented to UF’s HealthStreet team. HealthStreet engages with our community to reduce disparities in access to services and research to improve health and well being. It was a great chance to get our information out to the provider of mobile clinics all over the North Florida region.
March 25-29 - Flagler College Disability Awareness Week
Florida Legal Services participated in 3 events throughout the week including speaking as a panelist, hosting a resource table, and moderating the ‘Being Michelle’ film screening discussion. These events reached several Flagler College students, faculty/staff, and St. Augustine community members. Thank you for letting us be a part of these efforts!
Landmark Fair Housing Cases & Memorandums Throughout History
Shelley v. Kraemer (1948) This decision held that "racially restrictive covenants" in property deeds are unenforceable. In this case, the "covenants" were terms or obligations in property deeds that limited property rights to Caucasians, excluding members of other races.
Keating Memorandum of 1991: When the Office of General Counsel sent the Keating Memo to HUD headquarters and regional counsel in 1991, Keating claimed that the two persons per bedroom standard was “rebuttable.” The memo also said that HUD officials should not use this standard alone to decide whether a landlord’s occupancy standards are discriminatory.
Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project, Inc. (2015) In this case, the Court decided that claims of racial discrimination in housing cases should not be limited by questions of intent. The Court upheld the application of disparate impact under the Fair Housing Act. Although the Court upheld the theory, it did impose major limitations on its application in practice.
Executive Order 13988 (2021): In Bostock v. Clayton County (2020), the Supreme Court held that Title VII’s prohibition on discrimination “because of . . . sex” covers discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation. Under Bostock‘s reasoning, laws that prohibit sex discrimination — including Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, as amended (20 U.S.C. 1681 et seq.), the Fair Housing Act, as amended (42 U.S.C. 3601 et seq.), and section 412 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, as amended (8 U.S.C. 1522), along with their respective implementing regulations — prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity or sexual orientation, so long as the laws do not contain sufficient indications to the contrary.
The federal Fair Housing Act (FHA) protects you from discrimination in housing based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability, and familial status. This applies to renting, buying, mortgages, appraisals, insurance, and looking for a place to live.
IF YOU THINK YOU’VE BEEN THE VICTIM OF HOUSING DISCRIMINATION, PLEASE CONTACT US AT:
407-801- 4224
850-680-1729 (Spanish)
fairhousing@floridalegal.org
www.floridalegal.org/fairhousing
The work that provided the basis for this publication was supported by funding under a grant with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The author and publisher are solely responsible for the accuracy of the statements and interpretations contained in this publication. Such interpretations do not necessarily reflect the views of the Federal Government.