Discrimination Lawsuit against NYCHA Housing Projects (Florida: to rent, condo, neighborhood)

[009]

Originally Posted by SeventhFloor

no they're talking about some actual documentation that supposedly exists....if this is true i want to see it.

I'm pretty sure it doesn't, but they do it anyways.

[SeventhFloor]

i believe they do....because that explains how the only jewish people i've ever seen in the projects were in williamsburg.

i just didnt think an actual written policy existed. because thats illegal.

[Guywithacause]

I have seen many Jewish people in the housing projects, because when they were FIRST built, many of the housing projects in the mid and north Bronx were filled with Jews fleeing the South Bronx. There are many old timers that never left...

But back to the topic at hand..I am still waiting for some legal advise on a possible lawsuit against NYCHA for discrimination. Hoepfully I will get some good feedback! It would certianly make news across the country...white people suing to get into the projects....!!!!

[apvbguy]

Originally Posted by Guywithacause

I have seen many Jewish people in the housing projects, because when they were FIRST built, many of the housing projects in the mid and north Bronx were filled with Jews fleeing the South Bronx. There are many old timers that never left...

But back to the topic at hand..I am still waiting for some legal advise on a possible lawsuit against NYCHA for discrimination. Hoepfully I will get some good feedback! It would certianly make news across the country...white people suing to get into the projects....!!!!

what guy can't realize is that except for a handful of jew controlled PJs the majorit white people do not aspire to live in pjs with the government assistance crowd so in order to fill the pjs they go to the people who are either too lazy to escape living in the pjs or those who don't know any better and in NYC that usually means blacks and hispanics, there is no basis for any legal actions

[Green Irish Eyes]

Originally Posted by Guywithacause

But back to the topic at hand..I am still waiting for some legal advise on a possible lawsuit against NYCHA for discrimination. Hoepfully I will get some good feedback! It would certianly make news across the country...white people suing to get into the projects....!!!!

There's a difference between de jure segregation (mandated by law) and de facto segregation (which is simply how things are). Legally, the NYCHA cannot discriminate against any applicants based on race, creed, color, religion -- all those federally-protected classes. Segregation within the projects is, most likely, a reflection of the applications submitted to the Housing Authority.

As has happened throughout New York's history (as well as other cities), when people of color move into an area, whites tend to move out. After World War II, public housing was often used for returning veterans -- typically caucasian -- and their families, and was viewed as a temporary situation.

As the veterans and other working class whites found permanent housing and moved out, poorer whites and blacks began to move in. This influx helped spur further "white flight," until the majority of residents were people of color.

Despite New York City's high rents, I doubt that many white people would, at this point, choose to live in a housing project. However, if a white family met the federal income limits and wanted to move in, they'd be eligible to do so and would go on the waiting list for an available apartment.

There's no discrimination here, so there's no grounds for a lawsuit. Sorry .....

[Marlin331]

Originally Posted by Guywithacause

Seventh, I believe the housing discrimination laws in NYC apply to outright discriminatory practices, as well as practices/policies that encourage or otherwise results in segregation/discrimination. However, I am not sure...which is why I posted this question.

Anyone know for sure whether such a lawsuit would have merit?

We just covered this exact issue in conjuction with the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which prohibits discrimination in housing on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, familial status, or national origin.

For those who care for an answer before a long explanation, the answer is NO, the fact that NYC public housing is only 5% "white" (don't know the actual statistic, just using guy's number) doesn't mean any discrimination is going on and you wouldn't have a case unless you could actually show a clear instance or pattern of discrimination against white people.

Here's the long answer: discrimination doesn't equal segregation (although discrimination sometimes leads to segregation). The fact that a housing project may be 99% black and less than 1% white/other does not mean that non-blacks are being discriminated against. Where is the discriminatory intent? If we're talking about a housing project in East New York, you'd be hardpressed to find many European/LatinAmerican/Asian people applying to live there. Most likely, virtually everyone who applies (and is therefore awarded) that housing is black. However, if large numbers if non-black people were applying and being rejected and thereafter sued the City for a violation of the Fair Housing Act, the burden would shift to the City to justify what was happening with a non-discriminatory reason. If the City can do this, the burden shifts back to the plaintiffs to show that thus reason is just a cover-up for racially discriminatory intent. However, if the City cannot do this, the plaintiffs win the case.

There is a case that almost exactly matches what guy is talking about. In United States v. Starrett City Associates (decided in 1988), the management of Starrett City, a large housing project in southern Brooklyn, used separate waiting lists for different racial and ethnic groups in order to maintain an "integrated" building. When accused of discriminatory intent, Starrett City Associates responded that they had a compelling reason for doing this: they wanted to maintain a harmonious racial/ethnic balance in the building so that all groups would feel welcome and no group would form an overwhelming majority. In practice, Starrett City was seeing an increase in black residents and wanted to cap the percentage of this group so that 1) white/Hispanic/Asian residents would not leave and 2) so that white/Hispanic/Asian residents would continue to move to the building. Because there weren't that many Hispanic and Asian residents living in the area at the time, the efforts were mainly aimed at getting Italian/Jewish/Russian/other Euro residents to stay. Though Starrett City may have had good intentions, it was exercising a racially discriminatory policy and lost its case.

If a housing project in the South Bronx that is 99% non-Hispanic white were to start using a policy that gave preference to non-Hispanic white applicants, it would likely be challenged and would MOST DEFINITELY be deemed illegal because it would be a blatant violation of the Fair Housing Act.
You can try to market to non-Hispanic white people all you want to try to get them to move into NYC public housing, but the second you try to institute a policy that favors them over other groups, the policy will be challenged and stricken down.

Edit: I want to add that the Supreme Court has said in a few different cases that quotas and racial balancing are both "patently unconstitutional." Whether we are speaking of schools, jobs, or housing; you CANNOT employ these methods even if you have a good-faith intent to achieve integration or foster racial and/or ethnic diversity.

[samyn on the green]

Such a suit was filed and the city ruled that it will racially discriminate against whites until whites were less than 30% of any given housing project. Look at page 24. There was a working family plan at NYCHA in the 1990's and this was moving more white families into projects that had moved in without the WFP. This case ruled the WFP was illegal because more white families were largely working families. After this case non-working non-white welfare families gained housing preference over working families.

[mead]

Using race as a category to determine things like housing, voting, or education is considered by the courts to be a suspect classiciation.

Therefore when the Courts look at such issues it will be judged under a test of strict scrutiny. In order to get through this test you must show that there is a compelling objective and only the most necessary means were used. There is a 99.99% chance that racial quotas or preferences will not pass this test as they are too broad and discrminatory. So I think that some type of preference for white applicants would be out of the question.

I don't think there is any real discrimination here, it is just self-selection among white people. The honest truth is that white people don't want to live in an area where they are a tiny minority. The majority of the people in this country are still white, so rather than being a minority in a place like the South Bronx most white people would rather just live somewhere else where they feel safe.

As was the case in Starett City, quotas can work to keep white people around, living in public housing, but they are only effective by blocking out other racial groups. With the case of Starett City they basically had 2 piles for applicants: black and non-black (mostly white). Tons of black applications flooded into the office, but only a trickle of white applications. The housing office gave preference to the white applicants in order to acheive racial stabilization in the complex. This sytem was ruled to be unconstitutional.

I have lived in Asia in an area where there was a lot of public housing. Over there the government's concern was more of acheiving some type of balance among the races rather than solely focusing on preventing discrmination. As a result there was a very balanced racial composition of the housing projects that I visited. Nothing at all like the ghettoization that you see in this country.

However the focus in the USA is pretty much solely on preventing discrimination, so much so that racial quotas are illegal in pretty much any and all circumstances.

[Guywithacause]

Thanks for the feedback all. It seems strange that there were many preferences, quotas etc for people of color in advanced education, and employment, but I did not see the same preferences for whites in housing projects in NYC. It is not clear whether whites just don't want to live in housing projects although they may qualify, or they don't want to live there because they would be the overwhelming minority. And if the latter is the case, I believe we are compelled as a society to provide PUBLIC housing to ALL, and if we cannot even intergrate PUBLIC housing, how can the government mandate "equality" but its own flawed policies are indirectly segregating and making public housing in NYC essentially unavailable to whites.

[LIOC]

The are never quotas base on race in hiring or higher Ed. It is illegal. You just have a misunderstanding of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action. But that is not what this thread is about.