A comprehensive housing report by the Chicago Area Housing Alliance, a non-profit organization, concluded that 40 years after the Fair Housing Act was first enacted, Blacks still face racial discrimination when renting or buying property.
“Racial and ethnic segregation still dominates the housing market,” said Rob Breymaier, author of the report The 2008 State of Fair Housing in the Six-County Chicago Region: 40 Years After the Fair Housing Act and executive director of the Oak Park Regional Housing Center. “So much more needs to be done to combat this problem.”
In 2006, 310 housing discrimination complaints were filed with the Illinois Department of Human Rights. Complaints filed in 2007 were not available at press time. The Chicago Commission on Human Relations, chaired by Dana Starks, former interim superintendent for the Chicago Police Department, reports only 54 housing discrimination complaints were filed in 2006 and 2007.
“That’s what’s wrong now. Too many people are experiencing housing discrimination but not making a formal complaint with any agency,” Breymaier added. “If more people filed, the number of complaints would probably be twice as high.” Even with home buying at a stand still, first-time buyers are still experiencing discrimination. Those who have experienced housing discrimination said it is humiliating as well.
“There’s nothing worse in this world as a Black man than being insulted in front of your family,” said Matthew Owens, 44. “I had called a realtor to arrange a showing for an apartment in Hyde Park. When I arrived with my family, the white realtor asked me in front of my family, ‘are you two legally married?’ I said yes we are and he responded ‘then I will need to see your marriage license because we have had problems renting to people who shack up and I know you people believe in that kind of stuff.’ That’s when I knew discrimination was still around.”
Katrina Little, 22, a graduate student at Chicago State University, said when she moved to Chicago from Miami in 2006, she looked at apartments on the North Side. “I wanted to be close to downtown and close to Northwestern University where I had planned to attend. The housing office at the school told me the North Side had good apartments. But what I wasn’t told was that very few Blacks live on the North Side,” she said.
“When I showed up to view an apartment, the white realtor told me she had some other units outside the Lincoln Park community. I said ‘no thank you, I like this area and this unit.’ She then said, ‘Wouldn’t you be more comfortable living around your own?’ I was so turned off that I decided to attend Chicago State University instead. I now live on the South Side in the Beverly community, and I love it because there are plenty of Blacks around.”
According to the report, in 2007, the Illinois Department of Human Rights received 410 fair housing complaints throughout the state, of which 259 originated in the six-county Chicagoland region. Owens nor Little filed a discrimination compliant. They said it probably wouldn’t have done any good. Richard and Barbara Nelson purchased a two-bedroom condominium in west suburban Oak Park after unsuccessfully trying to buy their first home on the West Side.
“Terrible is all I can say. Your first home buying experience should be exciting and memorable, not painful,” said Richard, 54. “When we tried to buy a home, the realtor told us that there were no Black families living on the block and asked if we were fine with that. ‘I’m just saying, why live around a bunch of whites when you can live in peace around your own kind. Nothing personal, but you should always consider who your neighbors are when buying a home’,” Richard recalled the Realtor as saying. “Barbara looked at me and I looked at her, and we knew then what time it was,” he said.
The Fair Housing Act of 1968 prohibits discrimination by direct providers of housing, such as landlords and real estate companies as well as other entities, such as municipalities, banks or other lending institutions and homeowners insurance companies whose discriminatory practices make housing unavailable to persons because of race or color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status or disability.
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