In the News

House weighs Fair Housing Act changes

July 30, 2010

By Tristan Hallman • Gannett • July 30, 2010
Gannett News Service

WASHINGTON — Nearly five years have passed since Hurricane Katrina destroyed thousands of Gulf Coast homes, but lawmakers and private officials believe the government is still botching the response.

Discrimination by private landowners and inaction by government officials — the same problems that affected government efforts following the 2005 hurricane — remain prevalent in many housing programs created to aid recovery efforts, Gulf Coast housing development leaders said at a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing Thursday.

Some said the Fair Housing Act needs to be changed to prevent such discrimination.

The 1968 law bars discrimination in housing. But witnesses at Thursday's hearing said discrimination is still a problem and may be getting worse.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., chairman of the Subcommittee on Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, cited online housing ads specifically requesting white tenants.

"Had these ads appeared in a newspaper, the publisher, in addition to the advertiser, would have been found to have violated the Fair Housing Act," Nadler said. "Because of a provision in the Communications Decency Act, these Internet publishers are protected."

James Perry, executive director of the advocacy group Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center, said the problem goes even deeper.

"In addition to individual landlords and apartment complexes engaging in discrimination, the actions of government entities and government bodies have made it increasingly difficult to recover," Perry said.

After Hurricane Katrina, government officials in Mississippi, Louisiana and in Congress created programs to assist recovery efforts.

Reilly Morse, an attorney for the Mississippi Center for Justice, said his group found that 5,000 people in Mississippi, mostly African-Americans, haven't received needed assistance from state officials. The disparity was evident in programs to repair wind-damaged homes, he said.

"Depending on which side of the track you lived, you could get $150,000, or nothing," Morse said.

Daniel Rothschild, director of the Gulf Coast Recovery Project at George Mason University, said the problem isn't necessarily that government officials are discriminating, but that they're becoming overly involved in recovery efforts.

"Federal and state policies designed to rebuild homes sowed confusion and uncertainty, making it difficult for people to make informed choices about how, when and where to rebuild," Rothschild said.

He said the government should set clear, simple rules, then get out of the way to allow rebuilding to take place from the ground up.

"Community leaders, clergy, social entrepreneurs have leveraged social capital and local knowledge to spur rebuilding, and over 1 million Americans have volunteered their time, some for weeks and some for years," he said. "They got it fixed and built houses one at a time."

Rothschild and Perry specifically criticized the Louisiana Road Home Program, which finances repairs to homes damaged by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Both said the program was ultimately discriminatory.

Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., sharply criticized Gulf Coast state officials for not moving to accept a larger role by the federal government.

"I regret that five years after Hurricane Katrina, we're still considering what went wrong," Conyers said. "But not only what went wrong, what continues to go wrong."

The hearing was part of a series by the subcommittee on the Fair Housing Act. Nadler said he plans to offer legislation at some point as a result of the hearings.

Contact Tristan Hallman at thallman@gannett.com