Bloomington IN code requiring rental owners to meet city maintenance standards will remove my Fair Housing Act Reasonable Accommodation. I have MCS, yet Paint, Caulk etc. must be applied by Owner before Feb 9 — only 19 business days. Does Bloomington have a ‘pattern and practice’ of discriminating against disabled renters?
In my still-preliminary review of the relevant Bloomington codes, I was puzzled to see no mention whatsoever of Reasonable Accommodation or other Fair Housing Act protections for disabled tenants. In some cases, although the letter of the law appears to allow citizens to engage in the appeals process, I have been repeatedly told by ‘the proper authorities’ that “only Landlords” can join in the appeals process. This “Landlords only” policy — even if unwritten — obstructs disabled tenants from engaging in the City’s only means of challenging a mandate from the City’s rental-maintenance enforcement arm.
I have been met with other forms of obstruction and delay from ‘appropriate’ City representatives since I learned that the Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Reasonable Accommodation I won in 2008 will be violated within the next 19 business days. The City will gladly expose me to chemicals prohibited by my 2008 Reasonable Accommodation. The City will gladly fine me $2500.00 for each day of non-compliance, and they will gladly see me evicted for non-compliance.
This situation has put my Landlord into a hard spot, too, because they must either knowingly violate their contract with HUD by violating the Reasonable Accommodation or they will lose their City Occupancy Permit, making them unable to rent any of the 150 units on the property.
I know my way around the HUD FHA disability civil rights territory, and as someone who has lived as a disabled person in this city for over 15 years, I know what State/local resources are available to me — they are FEW, and I am using all available ones already. So suggestions of ‘have your tried this agency/office/service’ will not be of any help in this situation — don’t waste your time looking them up, please! I really have ‘been there, done that’ many times over during the last 15 years.
As I explain in the Draft email below (to be refined and tossed over transoms this week), it looks to like Bloomington has ‘Pattern and Practice’ of discriminating against disabled tenants, because their relevant codes exclude disabled tenants from exercising their civil rights. This is a FHA violation (as is ‘obstrucing exercise’ of rights), but ‘Pattern/Practice’ is handled by DOJ, not HUD. A recent Supreme Court decision has (iirc) has established that ‘Pattern/Practice’ can be established without proving ‘Intention’— and the Bton City codes seem to represent just that sort of possibly-intentless Pattern/Practice.
This tack, plus pursuing a FHA complaint, plus seeing if the Legal Services attorney who is so great with evictions can intervene, are the only reasonable game plans I can come up with at this point.
Bloomington HATES any publicity or attention from outsiders that disturbs their self-fascination with Bton (and thus themselves) as just-too-hip-for-words.
If you feel the need to do something, email’s to Bton’s new mayor John Hamilton, might be a good idea: mayor@bloomington.in.gov . I dont use Facebook or Twitter, but something like ‘Bton’s pattern/practice of discrimination’ would be picked up, I believe, by people here.
Thanks for giving me a place to sound out my situation. And please excuse typos etc. I tried to put my draft in a blockquote, hope it worked.
HAND-MCS 2016: Bton 'Pattern/Practice' through exclusion of FHA protections?
begun Jan 9 2016
The City of Bloomington and their enforcement codes (ensuring that all rentals meet local maintenance codes) appear to have excluded all disabled tenants from exercising their FHA-defined civil rights, particularly tenants with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity (MCS) who require Reasonable Accommodation to be safe in their homes. Does this exclusion from Bloomington's rental codes constitute a 'Pattern and Practice of discrimination' by Bloomington toward its disabled renters, particularly for those disabled by the HUD-recognized disability of MCS?
The Bloomington Municipal Codes covering rental properties and 'Human' (civil) Rights' can be found at bloomington.in.gov/... . The codes regarding rentals are BMC 2.19, 2.21, 16.04, and 16.04; the City's only 'civil rights' code is BMC 2.21. All these codes exclude any mention of tenants' FHA civil rights for any classes. Particularly troubling is their exclusion of any mention of a disabled tenant's rights to Reasonable Accommodation in housing under the Fair Housing Act.
These codes give the City's 'HAND' division and its appeals board (BHQA) the apparent authority to evict (BMC 16.10) any tenant who does not cooperate with the Owner in obeying HAND's mandate and the very real authority of fining such a tenant $2500.00 per day (BMC 16/10, with each day considered an new violation) after the compliance deadline. Such a practice would be an excessive burden for any ordinary citizen, and an especially extreme penalty for impoverished disabled tenants.
The City's 'Human Rights' division (BMC 2.21) contains a list of practices that the City considers 'discriminatory/non-discriminatory'. The City omits from this list any mention of FHA civil rights including those rights unique to disabled people, thus giving the impression that the City's only civil-rights-related office does not consider discriminatory rental or housing practices as 'discriminatory'.
In my opinion, the City's exclusion of FHA's protected classes from its rental maintenance program constitutes a 'Pattern and Practice' of preventing protected-class tenants from exercising their FHA-defined civil rights, with a Disparate Impact on disabled tenants and especially severe Disparate Impact on tenants requiring a Reasonable Accommodation for MCS or other chemical sensitivity.
I was alerted to Bloomington's exclusion of FHA disability civil rights as a possible Pattern and Practice of discrimination on Tuesday, January 5 2016. At 9am that day, I learned that HAND was requiring the property's Owner to use paint, caulk, and other construction chemicals in my apartment or meet high fines and lose his HAND-provided Occupancy Permit. Losing his Occupancy Permit would make him unable to rent any of the 150 units in this HUD Project-Based Section 8 property, thus making more than 150 tenants unhoused. The Owner (YARCO) will be forced to choose between violating the Fair Housing Act or having his rental permit taken away. (This would seem to greatly increase by chances of being evicted, as the Owner could claim that continuing to uphold my MCS Reasonable Accommodation because has become an 'Undue Burden', which could allow him to evict me or begin using construction chemicals in my apartment again.)
I am a person with MCS/CFS whose disabling conditions have been recognized and accommodated in this apartment by three owners beginning with my move-in in 2000. In 2008, when the current Owner (YARCO) bought the property with plans and funding to renovate all units, I fought for and won a HUD/FHEO Reasonable Accommodation which recognized my MCS as a disabling condition requiring the Reasonable Accommodation of preventing chemical use in my apartment.
When I learned about HAND's mandate, I called and emailed a number of City representatives asking how I could protect myself and my civil rights. I was given confusing, misleading information by several City representatives who obstructed and delayed my exercise of my FHA civil rights. Chief among these obstructionist actors was the City Attorney who is also the Director of the City's Human Rights division, who is responsible for all human/civil rights enforcement in Bloomington.
The situation I describe in this email leads me to ask: Does the City of Bloomington IN have a 'Pattern and Practice of discrimination' toward its disabled tenants because its rental-maintenance and 'human rights' ordinances exclude the FHA housing rights of disabled tenants, and because responsible City representatives obstruct attempts for such tenants to exercise their civil rights?
