Fair Housing

A Baltimore fair housing watchdog group has settled a dispute with a Carroll County assisted-living center over allegations that the facility discriminated against a potential black applicant by using mostly white models in its advertising. Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc., a statewide fair housing advocate, and William Ray, 79, of Odenton agreed last week to a $22,000 settlement with Golden Crest Assisted Living of the 800 block of Fairfield Ave. in Westminster. "It's a success on everybody's part and good for Golden Crest, too," said Baltimore attorney C. Christopher Brown, representing BNI and Ray. "We think that diverse advertising is good for business.

Eager to attract immigrants to a city they've bypassed for decades, Baltimore is offering a limited number of $3,000 grants to Hispanics who buy houses here. Legal scholars and others - ranging from conservative critics of affirmative action and advocates for Asian-American rights to fair housing experts and the local head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People - question whether the offer is legal. The grants stem from Mayor Martin O'Malley's ambition to increase Baltimore's immigrant population.

Realtors association publishes calendar with student art As part of its observance of Fair Housing Month, the Maryland Association of Realtors will honor the winners of its Fair Housing Poster Contest. Maryland students were invited to create an illustration of the theme "Homes for All in 2004." The 12 winning posters are reproduced in a calendar that Maryland Realtors distribute statewide. This month marks the 35th anniversary of the enactment of the federal fair housing law. Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, creed, national origin, sex, familial status and handicap and encourages fair housing opportunities for all. The association offers continuing education courses to Realtors, including "At Home with Cultural Diversity: One America."

WASHINGTON - Linda Gagne and her husband, Alfred, thought they had found the perfect apartment in San Bruno, Calif. But when the couple met the landlord, she took one look at Gagne's guide dog and said she would not rent to them because of a strict no-pets policy. Gagne explained that her guide dog was not a pet, but rather a companion trained to assist her because she is blind. When the landlord still refused, Gagne decided to file a housing-discrimination complaint. The Gagnes are among the thousands of people across the United States who are victims of housing discrimination, according to a report released yesterday by the National Fair Housing Alliance.

Nearly five years ago, a concerned city housing official sent an e-mail to her colleagues urging a quick resolution to a complaint from Regina McCray, a partially paralyzed tenant who had been waiting years for an apartment to accommodate her needs. Warning of a potential lawsuit, the official wrote, "From a fair housing perspective, should Ms. McCray file a complaint with an outside agency, it would appear that we have taken an inordinate amount of time to accommodate her." That was May 20, 1998.

CHICAGO - In an ambitious program said to be the first of its kind in the nation, a local agency is training suburban immigrants to become fair-housing advocates, able to identify discrimination and negotiate with local governments throughout the six-county Chicago area. The Leadership Council for Metropolitan Open Communities hopes immigrants will be capable of working independently of fair-housing organizations, which are overwhelmed by the large number of cases in far-flung suburban areas.

Rouse was savvy, but not a saint There is a notion floating around Columbia that tends to overwhelm someone who arrives in town. It is the supposed sanctity of Jim Rouse. To celebrate it, the Columbia Association just re-erected a statute of him (and one of his brother). I arrived here only some two years ago, but I have been following public affairs for some 45 years. Based on what I have seen, this notion of sainthood stretches reality, and I do not think Mr. Rouse would have accepted it. Jim Rouse was not a bad person, better than most, but he was a human being, and was mostly focused like the rest of us on making a living.

WASHINGTON - They didn't leave their names, and they didn't say where they lived. But a few months ago, Tracey Gill started hearing their stories on her message machine. "These women were saying that their landlords were requesting sex in return for letting them stay in their apartments - demanding sex, I guess is more like it," said Gill, fair housing program manager at Baltimore Neighborhoods Inc. "It was just disgusting." But it was not the first time Gill had heard such a tale. "Year before last," she said, "we did have a woman who filed a complaint against a mortgage loan officer who basically said that only way she was going to get that loan was if she would `put out,' so to speak."

WASHINGTON - President Bush is set to nominate a Randallstown woman who runs a nonprofit that seeks affordable housing for seniors to a top post at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the White House announced yesterday. Carolyn Y. Peoples, 56, a Baltimore County native, would become assistant secretary for fair housing and equal opportunity if confirmed by the Senate. She said in an interview last night that the toughest task awaiting her is to address a "backlog" of complaints from people around the country who say they were denied housing illegally - because of their race, for example, or a disability.