NFHA Releases Report on Housing Discrimination against Katrina Evacuees
Feature Story by civilrights.org staff - March 24, 2006
Nearly two-thirds of African American evacuees from the Gulf Coast have encountered housing discrimination, according to a
new study by the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA).
In the study, white and African-American testers called rental housing providers about housing availability at several apartment complexes in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, and Texas. In sixty-five tests, callers requested the same size apartment for the same number of people, indicating that they were relocating because of Hurricane Katrina.
In 66 percent of the telephone tests, housing providers favored white callers over African-American callers. In three out of five tests in which the subjects applied in person at apartment complexes, housing providers favored whites over African Americans.
Discriminatory tactics used against African Americans included failure to tell African-America testers about available housing; failure to provide African American testers with any information; failure to return African-American testers' phone calls; quoting higher rents and security deposits for African-American testers; and offering special inducements to white testers.
On February 8, Shanna L. Smith, president and CEO of NFHA,
testified before the House Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity about the report's findings and other fair housing concerns in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
According to Smith, "As this population seeks a more permanent housing solution and contacts any number of housing providers, a sixty-six percent rate of discrimination could translate into hundreds of thousands of acts of discrimination against Katrina survivors."
Smith said that the housing situation in the Gulf Coast is dire, as "an untold number of people are staying with friends and family or living in cars, tents or damaged homes. All are in need of housing, and a large number of them are African-American."
NFHA will be conducting testing of rental housing practices in three more states. Initial results in two of the states show "high rates of race discrimination.". The organization also plans to conduct further tests this year addressing housing discrimination based on national origin, disability, and family status.
As a result of the study, NFHA has filed complaints with the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development against five apartment complexes under the Fair Housing Act, which prohibits housing discrimination on the basis of color, religion, sex, national origin, disability or familial status.
