For most landlords, Alice Trudeau would be considered a pretty good tenant.
“I pay my rent on time,” Trudeau said. “I was taking care of everything. I was mowing the lawn. I was trimming the shrubs. I was plugging the holes in the walls. I’ve treated the place as my own. I got to the point where I felt like the homeowner.”
But Trudeau’s landlord had a different opinion of her. After Trudeau, who has several medical issues, complained to the landlord several times about code violations in the home with no response, she finally reached out to CNY Fair Housing, a nonprofit agency that enforces fair housing laws and works to prevent discrimination. When the agency intervened on her behalf, that’s when Trudeau said her landlord showed her true colors.
“She’s a very difficult woman to deal with,” Trudeau said.
What is CNY Fair Housing?
CNY Fair Housing, which celebrated its 25th anniversary this year, is an independent nonprofit agency dedicated to enforcing the nation’s fair housing laws.
“We work to promote equal access to housing for all people,” said Karen Schroeder, assistant director.
While the organization officially covers eight counties in Central and Northern New York — Onondaga, Cayuga, Tompkins, Oswego, Madison, Oneida, Jefferson and St. Lawrence — it’s the only fair housing agency between Rochester and Westchester, so the six-person staff is often asked to intervene elsewhere in the state.
“There’s a huge gap in terms of private fair housing coverage,” said Sally Santangelo, executive director. “We could keep adding. We added two counties last year. There’s still more need. These communities want fair housing services.”
Though the need continues to grow, the staff — and the organization’s funding — doesn’t. CNY Fair Housing is supported by competitive federal grants from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, as well as local grants from Onondaga County and the cities of Syracuse, Auburn, Rome and Utica and other municipalities.
“We’ve had years where we weren’t funded,” Santangelo said. “If we don’t get funded we basically have to cut just about all the staff. It’s very difficult to go through.”
Without funding, the agency can’t work to prevent and correct discrimination in housing, a problem many don’t realize still exists.
“It’s so entrenched that people don’t even notice it in a way. It’s not the sign on the window that says, ‘No blacks’ and ‘No Mexicans’ or ‘No whatever.’ It’s subtle,” Schroeder said. “It’s the lost application. It’s the dragging your feet. It’s the, ‘That apartment just got rented.’”
“If you have a racially identifiable name, you’re less likely to get called back about an apartment,” Santangelo said. “If an African-American moves into a suburban community, they’re sometimes not welcomed by their neighbors. We’ve seen cases where people are called racial slurs by their neighbors, and then the neighbor’s friends with the landlord and they get evicted because they report it to the landlord.”
The discrimination isn’t just racial.
“People think discrimination, they think race,” said staff attorney Conor Kirchner. “Maybe they think disability. Nobody thinks, ‘I’m being discriminated against because the landlord doesn’t want my child on the second floor.’”
Indeed, landlords cannot refuse to rent to someone who has kids any more than they can refuse to rent to someone based on race or disability. They also have to provide accommodations to tenants who have disabilities. In Trudeau’s case, CNY Fair Housing asserts that her landlord failed to do so. Housing investigator Katie Clarke said it was a plowing issue that initially prompted Trudeau to call.
“She needed to make sure that she gets deliveries weekly or monthly for her disability,” Clarke said. “The plowing was sort of the entrance topic. I think a lot of times that’s how it starts. Then, it’s like an onion. You peel, you peel, you peel and all of a sudden it’s like, ‘Oh, wow. It’s really this.’ What seemed to be all these other things is and isn’t at the same time.”
In addition to the plowing problem and several code violations including a hole in the wall, Trudeau had an emotional service animal her doctor had suggested after her latest bout with cancer. Though she shouldn’t have been, Trudeau was paying a pet fee on top of her rent. In an attempt to resolve the problem, Kirchner sent a letter to Trudeau’s landlord advising her of Trudeau’s rights and asking her to address the issues.
“Sometimes that’s all it takes,” Schroeder said. “Sometimes it’s just a matter of Conor making a call or Katie making a call and just saying, ‘This is [what should be happening.]’”
Part of CNY Fair Housing’s job is to educate landlords on tenants’ rights.
“We do a lot of education, a lot of outreach,” Santangelo said.
“It’s getting people to view things in a different way,” Schroeder said. “It’s hard. You have people that have been doing business a certain way for so long, or even people living a certain way for so long. Things are changing at a pretty quick pace. We try and reach out to as many landlords as possible.’
Representing the marginalized
Many times, once a landlord is made aware of an issue, he or she is quick to make any necessary accommodations for the tenant. For a client with disabilities, it could be the addition of grab bars in the shower or a handicapped ramp, or, like in Trudeau’s case, waiving fees for emotional support or service animals.
“Sometimes the landlords don’t know what they’re obligated to do,” Kirchner said. “Once they find out, they say, ‘Oh, I didn’t realize that. I’ll make sure to do that in the future.’ Those are the good cases.”
Other times, things get more complicated. CNY Fair Housing recently won a lawsuit against Baldwinsville property owners Robert Weichert, a disbarred attorney, and Susan Weichert, who were found to have discriminated against a potential tenant with disabilities. The New York State Division of Human Rights ordered the couple to pay $16,000 in damages and penalties. Robert Weichert’s appeal to the State Supreme Court was denied.
“He said he ‘didn’t need to rent to crazy people,’” Schroeder said.
While such flagrant statements seem horrifying, they’re actually good news to the employees of CNY Fair Housing.
“When we get good evidence on a case, we’re all really excited because we have a good case to file,” Santangelo said. “Then we’re like, wait a second, we’re really excited because there’s discrimination? It’s because we know there’s always cases that we can’t prove. When we’re able to prove it, and we have a solid case, and know we can file, and get relief for our client, it’s exciting.”
However, most of the time, the discrimination is so subtle even the tenants aren’t sure there’s anything they can do about it.
“Oftentimes, folks that we’re dealing with might be low income or have other challenges, mental or physical disabilities,” Schroeder said. “They’re used to being treated in a shabby manner or having no lease or living in a place that certainly would never meet codes in any way. Every day is a struggle. They don’t even have it in themselves to fight one more fight. They’re exhausted.”
According to Santangelo, some 90 percent of fair housing cases go unreported nationwide.
“We have to talk people into pursuing a case,’’ she said.
“When we go out, especially in the neighborhoods, and people talk about it,” Schroeder said. “We’re like, ‘Why didn’t you call us?’ They’re like, ‘I don’t know, it’s just kind of daily life.’”
The agency relies on “middle men” — social workers, caseworkers, teachers and others who come into contact with people daily who might witness housing discrimination — to refer potential clients.
“We have a fairly decent referral network,” Schroeder said. “They are really on the front lines of these folks who are having these housing challenges.”
However, that still leaves a sizable gap. As such, the organization utilizes housing testers, volunteers who are specifically trained to test the reactions of property owners, landlords and real estate agents while they try to buy, rent or finance a home or an apartment.
“We can’t rely just on complaints to uncover discrimination,” Santangelo said. “We have to be able to go out and test landlords and test real estate agents to see what’s happening.”
A more cohesive community
The agency asserts it is not trying to hurt landlords or violate their rights.
“Fair housing isn’t saying that you have to take a bad tenant or every person. It just says that you have to be consistent and fair in how you’re judging the tenants,” Schroeder said. “You need to judge everyone with a new face and by the same standards.”
In Trudeau’s case, the housing agency says her landlord was anything but fair. After the nonprofit intervened on her behalf, Trudeau’s landlord threatened to evict her. Fair Housing was able to negotiate a six-month renewal while Trudeau looked for alternate housing — she wanted to stay in the house in Tully until her daughter finished high school in June — but the landlord raised the rent. She failed to fix any of the code issues. Ultimately, the agency brought a complaint before the New York State Division of Human Rights. The complaint is still pending.
“She’s not a high maintenance tenant. She’s just asking for simple stuff,” Kirchner said. “Now the landlord is withholding her security deposit and claiming there are $6,860 in damages to the apartment, including an unexplained $1,600 charge for ‘painting.’ … For what it’s worth, I believe this is a form of retaliation against Ms. Trudeau for filing the fair housing complaint.”
Thanks to advice from the staff at CNY Fair Housing, Trudeau was able to buy a house in North Syracuse. She moved out of the property in Tully, though her case is still ongoing.
“It was really to the point where I felt like I was having a nervous breakdown. Thank God I contacted Fair Housing,” she said. “They calmed me down a lot. I was starting to feel guilty. I was starting to believe what she was saying about me. You kind of felt like you’re actually doing something wrong.”
Both Schroeder and Santangelo emphasized that housing discrimination is not just an inner-city problem, nor is poverty.
“That demarcation line between the city and the suburbs, especially when you’re talking about the inner ring suburbs, it doesn’t make sense anymore,” Schroeder said. “You’ve got some of the highest poverty rates right in East Syracuse.”
That’s why it’s so important to emphasize community in Central New York, Santangelo said.
“If you were to start in downtown Syracuse and drive in any direction, you wouldn’t know where those lines are,” she said. “I live in Liverpool and I grew up in North Syracuse. If I were to travel outside of New York state and somebody were to ask me where I’m from, I will tell them I’m from Syracuse. I think that’s the way we all think in the community. Our governing structures need to reflect that reality a little more. You can’t just root for the Orange and that’s where it ends.”
