A Conversation About Housing Discrimination for People Using Lawful Sources of Income
Lawful source of income under the NYC Human Rights Law includes housing subsidies or assistance from federal, state, or local public sources, such as Section 8 vouchers, FHEPS, CITYFHEPS, HASA Supplemental Security Income and other cash and rental assistance programs.
In 2018, more than 5 million people nationwide received Section 8 vouchers, a federally-funded program designed to ensure neighborhood integration. Unfortunately, many New Yorkers will never be able to use them because landlords and real estate agents refuse to accept tenants seeking to pay for housing using these programs. In New York City, it is illegal for a landlord to refuse to accept prospective housing tenants relying on any form of public assistance. The New York City Commission on Human Rights is fighting to end this all-too-common form of housing discrimination. On this second-year anniversary of the formation of the Source of Income Unit, we spoke with Sapna Raj, the Deputy Commissioner of the Law Enforcement Bureau, and Stephanie Rudolph, the Director of the Source of Income Unit to learn more.
Q: What does the Law Enforcement Bureau (LEB) do?
Raj: LEB enforces the New York City Human Rights Law which protects against discrimination in housing, employment, and public places. There are over 20 protected classes covered by our law, including, but not limited to gender, religion, national origin, race, and lawful source of income in housing.
Q: What is discrimination on the basis of lawful source of income and why is it a problem?
Raj: Source of income discrimination occurs when a landlord refuses to accept a tenant because they will be paying the rent using a subsidy, voucher, or other form of public rental assistance. Less obvious forms of source of income discrimination include a landlord imposing requirements like additional deposits, more documentation, or credit checks for people using public rental assistance that are not imposed on people who will be paying their rent by other means.
Rudolph: Source of income discrimination is a huge problem in New York City because of biases and prejudices against people who rely on publicly-sourced rental assistance. Over the years, we have found that some landlords refuse to rent to non-working people because of possible assumptions about tenants based on race, partnership status, presence of children, and disabilities. Source of income discrimination excludes low-income renters not only from affordable long-term housing, but amenities such as ready access to public transportation, healthy grocery stores, cultural events, and green spaces. Because many rent-regulated apartments and housing vouchers can be passed on from parent to child, source of income discrimination can have generational effects on a neighborhood.
Q: The SOI Unit has been around for two years. What trends and patterns have you seen from complainants during this time?
Rudolph: While some landlords and real estate agents are still overtly discriminating against those using rental assistance by blatantly stating “we do not take vouchers,” more and more, real estate agents are “ghosting” prospective renters, by not responding to inquiries from an applicant as soon as they learn that an applicant has a housing voucher or subsidy. Sometimes, a real estate agent will tell an applicant with a rental voucher or subsidy that the apartment about which they inquired has “already been rented to a qualified applicant” when, in fact, it remains available to rent.
Q: What does the Commission do to prevent source of income discrimination?
Rudolph: The Commission has investigated and prosecuted source of income cases since 2008 when this protection was added to the New York City Human Rights Law. In January 2018, we established a Source of Income (SOI) Unit to further focus our work on fighting source of income discrimination, respond more quickly to those at risk of losing their homes and rental subsidies, prevent evictions from affordable housing, and deepen relationships with community-based organizations that are working to combat homelessness.
Raj: The lawyers pursue complaints against landlords and real estate agents who violate the source of income provision of the New York City Human Rights Law. In the past six years, the Commission’s Law Enforcement Bureau has ordered over $783,000 in damages and penalties for source of income violations under the New York City Human Rights Law. Further, the SOI unit has helped place hundreds of New Yorkers in housing as part of their intervention and complaint process.
Rudolph: Specialists conduct emergency interventions with landlords and real estate agents in “real time” on behalf of people facing discrimination on the basis of their housing voucher or subsidy. Interventions aim to restore a housing subsidy, help prevent or delay an eviction, ensure a long-term tenant can use a new subsidy or voucher, and place applicants searching for housing in affordable and habitable rental units. Cooperating landlords and real estate agents may face lower monetary penalties by mitigating damages faced by applicants unlawfully denied housing. Since the formation of the SOI Unit, the Commission has helped over 350 New Yorkers and their families through the intervention process. The intervention process ensures that New Yorkers facing housing discrimination keep their housing subsidies and vouchers and can remain in New York City as long-term tenants.
Q: In the past year, can you tell us about an influential case the LEB is working on?
Raj: The Commission, representing 10 complainants, has sued a large landlord that imposed a minimum income requirement on housing applicants. Familiar to renters with language like “you must earn income of 40x times the rent,” these minimum income requirements essentially act to automatically reject applicants who use housing vouchers or subsidies. In many cases, a voucher would pay for all of the rent. As the first case of its kind, we are challenging this practice at trial that is scheduled to begin later this year.
Rudolph: Additionally, the Commission is now working on settlements that will require landlords to “set aside” a certain number of apartments for people with vouchers or rental subsidies. That means landlords who have not rented to people with vouchers before will now be mandated to do so. We are very proud of this because it will ensure that vulnerable people have housing, and that landlords will commit to this approach. Moving forward, we hope that landlords will come to understand that voucher holders are not a problem, that they are renters like any other renters in the city, and that they’re guaranteed rent from a secured government source.
Q: What drives you and the team to do this kind of work?
Raj: Before the Commission, I was an attorney specializing in fair housing, and what I came to realize was stable housing is the most important thing and a necessity in a person’s life after food and clothing. You may not have a job, but you still want to have a roof over your head. To be practically homeless because you are not able to find a safe dwelling is one of the toughest things a human being can face. To be denied housing even though you have the capacity to move into a place that is affordable and safe is one of the worst forms of discrimination.
Rudolph: I grew in an extremely segregated part of Long Island and recognized, early in life, the inequities between my public school district and that of a low-income neighboring district. While my public school subsidized language learning trips to France, the neighboring district lacked sufficient funds to even offer after school sports. After graduating from law school, I worked at organizations that invested in the community lawyering model of social change. Each of my legal cases had a robust connection to a larger movement for socioeconomic, racial and housing justice. While government often has a reputation for being removed from the community, the City Commission on Human Rights has deep ties to New York City communities. Our team works to maintain those connections and respond to the changing and evolving needs of the historically underserved communities we serve.
