Finding a new place to live can create all kinds of feelings, from excitement to anxiety. But looking for a new place where you and your family call home should NOT make you feel like you’re being discriminated against.
Hope Williams, supervising attorney with N.C. Legal Aid’s Fair Housing Project, said anyone who feels like they have encountered discrimination during the search for a place to live has some recourse.
The Fair Housing Act became law in 1968, a time when discrimination may have been more blatant. “We are still fighting to stop discrimination in housing,” she said on Monday’s TownTalk, although today’s cases may be more subtle – and perhaps more difficult to prove.
She said her office has three attorneys that serve the whole state. They are able to represent some clients, but they simply don’t have the staff to take on all the cases.
“We talk to people who call us and we give them advice about their legal issues,” she said. They help clients file administrative complaints with the federal Housing and Urban Development agency and with the N.C. Human Relations Commission.
They also focus on community education and training to raise awareness about what discrimination is and what it looks like. For instance, many people wrongly assume that fair housing rules only apply to subsidized housing. Not true. It applies to all housing.
Administrative complaints must be filed within one year of the encounter; there is an option to file a complaint in the courts system, which has a two-year window.
One piece of advice Williams has for anyone who feels that they have been the subject of housing discrimination: document everything.
Looking at interactions and communications over time sometimes can help provide critical evidence. “We make timelines to look for patterns,” she said.
Many complaints come from individuals with disabilities. Landlords must comply with “reasonable accommodations” that allow disabled people access. In such cases, the tenant is responsible for the cost of the accommodation – think wheelchair ramp or other physical structure – and for returning the dwelling to its original state if and when they vacate the dwelling.
The bottom line is a landlord can’t just refuse to allow a reasonable accommodation.
Same thing with a service animal, Williams said. A person who uses a service animal would be responsible for any damage by an animal, but he or she can’t be required to pay an upfront pet fee.
Call the Fair Housing Project’s direct line at N.C. Legal Aid at 855.797.FAIR.
Visit www.fairhousingnc.org to learn more.