Good morning.

My name is Minyard Culpeper.

City Council District Seven and the Chair of the Boston City Council Committee on Civil Rights, Racial Equity, and Immigrant Advancement.

Today is July twenty-fourth.

The exact time is ten oh two.

This hearing is being recorded and it is also being live streamed by Boston.gov backslash city council TV and broadcast on Xfinity Channel Eight.

RCN Channel 82, files, channel nine six four.

Written comments may be sent to the committee.

Email at CCC dot civil rights at Boston.gov and will be made part of the record and available to all counselors.

Public testimony will be taken at the end of this hearing.

If you're interested in testifying in person, please add your name to the sign-up sheet near the entrance of the chamber.

If you are looking to testify virtually, please email our central staff liaison Megan Kavanaugh at Megan dot Kavanaugh at Boston.gov.

Let me just repeat that.

If you're looking to testify virtually, please email our Central Staff Liaison, Megan Cavanaugh at Megan dot Cavanaugh at Boston.gov for the link and your name will be added to the list.

Today's hearing is on Docket O three nine.

Order for a hearing regarding housing voucher discrimination and fair housing civil rights enforcement in Boston.

This matter was sponsored by myself, Councilman Culpepper, and Brian Will, Council World, and we'll be referred to the committee was referred to the committee on July eighth, twenty twenty-six.

339, order for a hearing regarding housing voucher discrimination and fair housing civil rights enforcement in Boston.

I will follow up with any additional questions upon reviewing my staff's notes and watching the record.

Please do not hesitate to contact my staff with any questions.

Sincerely, Boston City Council, District 5, Enrique Pepin.

Good morning, everyone.

I want to thank my colleague for that letter of absence.

And I want to thank the administration, our panelists, members of the public for joining us for this important discussion on housing voucher discrimination and fair housing civil rights enforcement in Boston.

I filed this hearing order because fair and equal access to housing is fundamentally a civil rights issue, and I have become increasingly concerned by reports of housing discrimination in Boston, particularly against residents who rely on housing vouchers.

In a city where finding an affordable apartment is already extraordinarily difficult, no qualified renters should face an additional barrier simply because of their race, source of income, or the lawful rental assistant they use to pay their rent.

Another one of the primary reasons I filed this hearing was the findings from the Fair Housing Report produced by Suffolk University Law Schools Housing Discrimination Testing Program, the Boston Foundation, an analysis group titled Qualified Renters Need Not Apply.

The findings were deeply concerning.

Through match pair testing and Greater Boston rental market, researchers found evidence of voucher discrimination in 80% of the tests and race-based discrimination in 71%.

White market rate renters were able to view apartments 80% of the time, compared with 48% for similarly situated black market rate renters.

For renters using vouchers, those rates fell to just 12% for white voucher holders and 18% for black voucher holders.

The city also recognized the importance of continuing this work during the fiscal year 27 budget process.

Through a budget amendment, we successfully secured 100,000 to continue Boston's Fair Housing Testing Program.

Testing is one of the most important tools we have for identifying discrimination that may otherwise go undetected.

And today I want to better understand how we can build upon that investment.

What is especially troubling is how early in the housing search this discrimination can occur.

The report documented voucher holders being ghosted after disclosing that they intended to use a voucher, being told about fewer available apartments, being shown fewer units, and being less likely to receive an application or follow-up communication.

In other words, a qualified renter may be denied a meaningful opportunity to even compete for an apartment before they ever submit an application.

That report was published six years ago.

Today I want us to understand what has changed since then, and more importantly, what has not.

My final reason for this hearing today is when I was the regional counsel at HUD, and this report came out.

We were looking at ways to file a suit based on some of the information that was gathered in the report.

One of the challenges we had as regional council, I was looking for a larger apartment complex to file suit against We didn't find that larger housing complex.

And before I could put the suit together, I had resigned or retired and was running for the Senate.

Didn't win that race, but I came back to run for city council, and lo and behold, I end up sitting here this morning.

And my interest in this Section 8 discrimination has not waned at all.

One of the things I hope we can talk about that I did see in the report was where it listed that a team wanted to come together to file lawsuits against some of the owners.

So with that, uh I would like to introduce panel two.

We have two of the panelists who will be on Zoom, and then we'll move to panel one to the city's uh.

They here?

Great.

So let's start with the two panelists on Zoom.

Uh Girlwyn Linson, Esquire, Senior Attorney, with the lawyer of civil rights and Brooke Simone Esquire.

Brooke.

Are you there, Brooke?

Uh, Councilmember Culpepper, can you hear me?

Great.

I can hear you, and I can see you.

Great.

It's actually just gonna be me, Jillian Lenson, who's gonna testify.

Well, you have six minutes, and you can start right now.

Thank you.

Great, great.

Thank you, Councilmember Culpepper, and thank you to the entire committee for holding this important hearing and for inviting lawyers for civil rights to testify.

My name is Jillian Lenson.

I'm an attorney at Lawyers for Civil Rights, and I am proud to be here speaking on behalf of an organization with such a long record of fighting for housing opportunities for communities of color in Boston, including by securing more vouchers for Boston residents through our landmark NAACP v HUD litigation, and more recently by bringing a lawsuit against over 20 Boston area landlords and real estate brokers for voucher discrimination.

Lawyers for Civil Rights is also grateful to serve on the city's critical, and this is a mouthful, so bear with me, affirmatively furthering Fair Housing Community Advisory Committee.

Before diving deeper into how into voucher discrimination, I would be remiss if I didn't name the unique moment the city is in.

Last year, Boston became the target of a baseless federal fair housing investigation because of its efforts to combat deep-rooted housing inequality.

As lawyers for civil rights is set forth in a letter to the city, HUD's investigation has no basis in law and no basis in fact.

What fair housing law actually requires is that Boston remain firm in its commitment to provide housing opportunities and overcome segregation for communities of color.

We implore Boston to stand on the right side of law and of history in responding to HUD's investigation.

Pivoting back, the topic of today's hearing could not be more urgent.

Housing inequality in Boston is endemic, and as a 2020 Fair Housing Report that you just mentioned, Councilmember details racial and voucher holder discrimination, which exists and persists at an alarming degree, is a driving force of this disparity.

In the midst of a statewide affordable housing crisis, which disproportionately harms communities of color, vouchers are a critical tool for combating housing inequality and for integrating communities.

But discrimination against voucher holders by real estate brokers, landlords, and property management companies alike is pervasive, even though this type of discrimination is illegal under both state statute and Boston's municipal code.

In fact, the reason we cannot testify in person today, and we appreciate you accommodating us on Zoom, is because housing subsidy providers in Worcester asked us to conduct a training on this very issue this afternoon.

The pervasiveness and normalization of this type of discrimination is a moral crisis.

By definition, voucher holders are members of a vulnerable population, often moving out of shelters or other unstable housing conditions, and are relying on the ability to use these subsidies to house their families.

Sometimes these families sit on wait lists for over a decade, only to have the door literally slammed in their face during the limited window they have to use their vouchers.

At its heart, voucher discrimination is fueled by baseless stereotypes about the types of people who rely on them and the types of tenants they will be without any regard to who these individuals are, little on the circumstances they've endured or the resilience they have exhibited.

Voucher discrimination is also one of the areas where housing providers are most emboldened to explicitly discriminate against applicants or exploit tenants.

Individuals are told point blank that voucher holders aren't welcome, that they are and they are subject to legal conditions to prove that they are deserving of housing units, or as council member you mentioned, they're ghosted time and time again before they can even schedule a tour.

Just this month, a multi-state enforcement action was filed against a national property management company for over a hundred documented instances of this type of explicit illegal action.

And because of the time pressure and vulnerability associated with housing vouchers and other subsidies, we hear from community members that even when they face this type of explicit discrimination, they don't feel like they can advocate for their rights because they have no choice but to move on and try and find housing for their families before their subsidies expire.

In short, this is an urgent problem that requires an urgent response from Boston and its Fair Housing Commission.

And to this end, we support the important recommendations in the 2020 report.

Specifically, the Boston Fair Housing Commission should prioritize training and public education to ensure that housing providers know their obligations and tenants and housing subsidy administrators know their rights and they know how to advocate for them.

And the commission should ensure meaningful mechanisms to hold bad actors accountable, including increased penalties for real estate providers who discriminate and fast acting enforcement.

The city should commit resources for testing and to support impact litigation to change policies through affirmative lawsuits, interventions, and amicus briefs.

And critically, the city should support families who are at risk of losing these subsidies because of discrimination, including by maximizing program flexibilities and by investing in staff and resources to help tenants quickly advocate.

Voucher discrimination is not unique to Massachusetts, but as the first state to include source of income discrimination in our civil rights statute, and with Boston following shortly thereafter with its own prohibition, Massachusetts and Boston have both held themselves out as leaders in this space.

Unfortunately, as is so often the case, having a law on the books is not enough.

Boston must invest the resources to meaningfully combat voucher discrimination and in turn help redress housing inequality and segregation within the city.

At lawyers for civil rights, we will continue to fight relentlessly to further housing inequality for communities of color and low-income families, and we look forward to your continued partnership in this effort.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I know you're short on time.

And so I've got a few questions that I wanted to ask you.

You mentioned that you had filed suit against 20 owners.

And talk a little bit about this.

So when did you file the suit?

If you can talk about who the owners were and the basis for that suit.

Was that one suit against 20 owners at Class X?

Yes, it was filed in 2024.

It actually predated my time with lawyers for civil rights.

Um, but but yes, it was 20 Boston area landlords and real estate brokers for voucher discrimination and the type of and included uh testing component, and it was the type of explicit discrimination that I just discussed and that you mentioned as well.

Um landlords and real estate brokers who were willing to explicitly say that voucher holders weren't welcome and would ghost individuals who were trying to find properties and would do so directly to tenants.

Umfortunately, this case was dismissed on a procedural motion.

Um, but we continue to look for avenues to fight to further this enforcement because as I just discussed, it's pervasive, and we need lawsuits like this to continue.

So the case is not pending any longer.

Unfortunately, no, it was dismissed.

Okay.

And you were you made some recommendations to the city.

I just wanted to make sure that I caught all of those recommendations.

Can you just make them a talk about them a little slower?

So I can assure I go on.

Yeah, absolutely.

So the first thing I discussed, and a lot of these are also in the 2020 report.

Um, but the city should really prioritize training and public education because one thing that we see with voucher holder discrimination is for whatever reason, um, landlords and real estate brokers and property management companies, some of them just don't know.

They think it's okay to discriminate against this population, maybe because it's not in the federal Fair Housing Act.

Um, and so we really need to affirmatively make sure that all of the folks who are gateways to accessing housing for voucher holders know their rights and their obligations and know that they will be held accountable.

So um investing in that affirmative training and public education is gonna be really important, both on the um housing property management, I'll say that as a collective term side, and then on the other side, that advocacy for tenants and voucher holders to know that they do have those rights and how they can advocate, knowing that they can file free complaints, knowing that um that that they are entitled to access properties without this type of discrimination is really important.

So that public education and training and a real meaningful investment in that is one.

Um and then meaningful mechanisms to hold that actors accountable.

I think even though I said there are some, you know, housing uh providers who don't know this is legal, there are a lot that do, but I think they think this has become so normalized that they can continue to behave this way.

And if there are increased penalties, one of the recommendations that was in the 2020 report that I think is really important is uh penalties, increased penalties for real estate providers, they're kind of the first level of access to homes, and if they're steering folks away or are saying this isn't welcome here before someone can even get to a landlord, um, that's that's really terrible and it's really gonna prevent opportunities through these through this program.

So increased penalties for real estate providers who are caught doing this, and an easy way to do that.

And then also fast acting enforcement, as I talked about, these these subsidies are time limited, and so even though you can wait for over a decade, um, you may only have a matter of months to use them.

And so if there isn't a way to hold your to follow up with a landlord or have support advocating and and to hold landlords accountable quickly, not through like a two-year investigation, but something that quickly says, okay, this is an explicit discrimination, we need to step in here.

Um it's it's not gonna get better.

Um, and then the other recommendation that I talked about was for the city to commit resources for testing and to support impact litigation to change policies so um by supporting affirmative lawsuits itself or intervening in lawsuits or filing amicus briefs when this issue is uh being addressed.

Um, and then a way to support families directly who are at risk of losing these subsidies even though they've waited for years to access them.

So are there ways that Boston can provide program flexibility?

So if someone has been subjected to discrimination, can they have some additional time to use their subsidy?

Um, or are there other flexibilities we can use to make sure that folks aren't losing these subsidies just because of the discrimination they're facing?

Um, and really having the staff and resources to kind of quickly address these issues because of that time pressure.

I think the report described this as a um as strike force.

I think that's a great idea.

A group of people who know how to advocate, who can quickly do that and to try to place people because we hear directly from the amazing community organizations who are trying to place folks that they don't have the time and resources to advocate because they're just trying to place folks and do it as quickly as possible, and so they really need that support.

One of the things that that would be helpful for me uh is to get a copy of the case, the dismissal from the beginning to the end.

I just want to see uh the complaints.

I want to see how they move to dismiss and then I just want to look at what housing providers uh you filed suit against and maybe talk a little bit about what evidence uh you had that formed the basis for the complaint.

And uh and I can also send you the um multi-state enforcement action that was filed earlier this month.

Great.

Um where was that filed?

Superior court or in federal court.

It was actually not filed in Massachusetts.

Um and they were, I believe they're all administrative complaints to start.

Um, but hopefully we'll turn into lawsuits.

Where were they filed?

It's like 10 differences.

You can get it to me when you get a chance.

Okay.

I'd like to see that too.

Yeah, absolutely.

Do you know what states were involved in this suit?

Yeah, it was California, Hawaii, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, Virginia, and DC, and it's against Graystar, LLC, who's the largest pro largest landlord in the United States.

Was that the lawyers committee that filed that?

No.

Okay.

Who filed it?

It was Housing Rights Initiative and Cohen Milstein.

Okay.

Which is based in DC.

You're not part of that suit.

Not this specific suit, but we are actively looking at this issue, including by going out to Worcester today to help folks advocate.

Okay.

And so if you could just give us the document number, all the information regarding that so what state was filed in administrative complaints, not in federal court.

For this national multi-state enforcement action, yes.

Who was it?

Who was the administrative case filed with the multi-state case?

The different agencies in the different states?

So, yeah, so it's a multi-state.

They weren't filed against landlords.

Oh owners.

It was filed.

They were they're filed against Graystar LLC, who's a national landlord, and I believe has properties in Massachusetts, but it was filed so filed all at once with evidence across states, but in different stiff civil rights, state civil rights agencies, is my understanding.

Okay.

Not with any federal agencies, but with the specific state agencies for each state.

Exactly.

Okay.

Okay.

It'd be helpful to see that the other information.

Okay.

Thank you.

You have any closing?

Thank you.

You have any closing remarks?

No, I just want to thank you again for hosting this hearing and calling attention to this really important issue.

Again, we hear about this all the time from community members, and I think you mentioned before it's hard to find mechanisms to provide accountability.

Um I think the more resources we can invest in this, and the more we can all work together to try and um mitigate um the discrimination that has become so pervasive in this area, the better.

So I look forward to, I'm sorry I can't be there in person, but I look forward to connecting with you about this issue and any other of the panelists there today.

No, thank you for taking the time and thank you for even being on Zoom.

We appreciate that.

We'll we will be in touch with you.

Thank you.

Great.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Like to now so we're we're pivoting now to the administration's witnesses.

We'll come back to the second panel uh when we finish the administration's witnesses.

I think they're also on a real tight schedule.

So I'd like to call uh Chief uh Severa.

Are you here?

Commissioner Chief of Equity and Inclusion and Virginia Albert with you.

Come on, Virginia, assistant director of civil rights for the Boston Housing Authority.

Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule.

Uh and uh each of you will have six minutes.

And Chief, uh if you're ready, we'll start with you.

Good to see you.

Thank you, Counselor.

Um good morning, everyone.

Uh I am here as the Chief of Equity and Inclusion who oversees um multiple departments including including the Office of Fair Housing, Counselor.

Uh last time I was here, we had an exchange with regards to um, you know, why don't we have uh up-to-date data?

Why haven't we hired an executive director?

And and and so I want to start with sort of just like honoring our our our great Bob Torrell, um, who is dearly missed.

So I'm gonna start very high level.

What is the Office of Fair Housing and Equity, and then my colleague from the Boston Housing Authority will do her piece and then we'll stay for obviously questions.

Great, thank you.

Thank you.

Uh first, what is fair housing?

And I want to just start with like the basics here, and counselor, not for you, because I know you are one of our experts here.

You can probably teach me a thing or two about fair housing.

But I want to make sure that the members of the public are aware of like what we're talking about here.

Um fair housing is a fundamental element of the civil rights movement and of our civil rights in our country that are currently under attack, and we as a city are now backing down.

Uh we are focused on addressing discrimination and affirmatively furthering fair housing.

The what we do piece is we investigate potential cases of housing discrimination, and we also you heard this from our panelists, we engage in outreach to the public.

And so I appreciate a lot of the recommendations that were already made with regards to this to make sure that people know their rights and responsibilities, both as tenants and as landlords.

But this is a little bit of the work that we do is related to investigations.

Um in order for people to file a complaint with our Office of Fair Housing, the discrimination must happen in the city of Boston.

An affected party must belong to a protected class, which I'll get to in a second, and it must be filed within 180 days of the discriminatory act.

And when it comes to our outreach, uh we are focused on implementing the assessment of fair housing, uh offering trainings and engaging with different fair housing organizations regionally and as well as nationwide.

Um I'm glad to hear from the panelists earlier that there is perhaps a misunderstanding or just the knowledge hasn't reached all parties, but we have our federally protected classes as well as our state protected classes.

Um I don't I don't need to go through this, but I know that today's focus is around uh vouchers holders and and income and race as well.

Case frequency, this is very small for us to see, but we tried to give us a little bit of data broken down by the different protected classes since July 1 of 2020.

We are looking at a total of 412 complaints.

Uh if there are more questions about that, I can get into the details of it.

But here we broke it down per protected class, and you will see the majority of them fall under the category of unknown or not categorized protected class.

And just to state what we are hoping to one day make fully true in the city of Boston is that nobody may discriminate against any potential or current tenants based on the receipt of public assistance or requirements of um section eight via voucher program or uh our rental assistance programs or anything of that nature.

And so my hope today is that we as a city get whatever questions, recommendations you may have, counselor, or maybe other counselors that show up, other experts, because as we've said in the past, we are getting very close to logging in our next executive director who will be receiving a team that has been skilled up in the last year, ensuring that they have what they need as investigators, our intake process that is um not only compliant but also effective in the way that we communicate with members of the public and other stakeholders, as well as gearing up for um the incoming director of investigations who will be starting in the next couple of weeks and um the testing program that we've also discussed in the past.

And so my hope here today is to get whatever further recommendations we have so that our future new executive director um does get everything that the person needs to have an effective start to the job.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, and uh few questions.

Um talk just a little bit about the assessment of fair housing that's in your presentation.

Just want to talk a little bit.

How is that being implemented?

The affirmatively furthering fair housing.

Um I am not going to be able to give you uh response in detail.

Um but I will say the work that our colleague Joyce, who is no longer with us, um, has found better opportunities in other places, has been doing up to point up to this date, has been working with our partners across Boston Housing Authority planning, etc.

to ensure that we are furthering our goals.

Everyone is aware of what their goals are.

Um and even with this pending alleged HUD investigation, we are we were being committed to the work.

But I will any like further detailed questions, I'll make sure that either, unless my colleague here can answer on the side of the Boston Housing Authority, I'll make sure that we get you answered.

Okay.

And I wanted to just ask if you know about the community advisory committee that was set up, whether they're in operation now, how it's working.

Is it is it more appropriate for you if I can ask maybe um members of my team to refresh my memory here?

But our members of the uh the CAC if I may, I just we have even within Fair Housing, we have our commission, the CAC, the monitoring committee, and so I am getting my my groups mixed up right now.

They don't want to answer this wrong here.

So if you maybe if I may why we hold that until uh you take your six minutes, you can make your presentation, and then you can add that into the presentation.

We can pick it up there.

Uh because I know the chief has to go.

I know she's on a tight schedule.

I know she has to go.

I wanted to, Chief, if you know about the cases that were filed between July 1, 2020 and 206 412.

It seemed like the largest percentage, 33% were of unknown or not categorized.

And so how does someone file a discrimination case and not have a basis for it or not have a category for it?

I have in this chamber a colleague of mine who is an investigator who can answer that question better than I can.

Are you okay if I ask?

Yes.

Absolutely.

Julia, yes, um counselor, I know who the experts are.

I'm not the expert on everything.

So I'll bring the actual experts to come answer that question if you don't mind.

I do want to uh say to everyone here that I've been joined by my colleague, Councillor Russian Lujin, and uh counselor when I finish with uh Chief Saver, then we'll come to you to give you five minutes to make your opening statements.

If you have questions of her before she leaves, uh I'll ask her to just stay for your questions, then we can move on.

Thank you.

Good morning.

Uh so to answer your question, some of that data might be marked as uncategorized simply as as a reporting issue.

And so um having only been in the position for about six months, I know that currently we use one uh uh management system for this data.

Uh this is replacing a previous system.

Uh that is correct.

Somebody that is filing a complaint of housing discrimination does have to indicate that they are a member of a protected class and that that complaint, or rather the alleged discrimination is because of that protected class.

Uh, but some of the data might not reflect that simply because of data input errors.

And so are are you telling me that when they filed the complaint, they didn't file under a protected class?

They did file, and the protected class under which they filed would be reflected in in the documents itself of of the case and the investigation, but it would not have showed up in the aggregation of the data if it was not marked in in in reporting.

So it's a reporting issue, not uh not a jurisdiction issue.

And so if someone filed and there was a reporting issue and the case was dismissed or not acted upon, what happens with the unknown or not categorized cases that were a system issue and not an issue caused by the person that filed the complaint.

So that it is the fact that it is not marked does not indicate that it was not investigated and and adjudicated.

Um what that is is that at the point of data entry, whoever was doing the data entry of the case would not have put that in, or it would not have shown up in it's a technical issue, not an issue of uh administration.

And I guess my point is it's in the category of not categorized.

What happens to the case from that point?

So the case will have been because of a protected class and it will have been uh uh processed and investigated and adjudicated if it made it to a hearing.

Um at the point of data entry for reporting, it may not have been input.

And so that is the reason that that it's showing up like that.

But the case is still pending and it's still being investigated and it's still being processed.

Yes, it could have been.

That's not an indication that it was not processed.

Okay.

And maybe you can or you can't answer these, but so we know that Boston is a pretty segregated city with regard to this country.

What specific initiative of being prioritized to break these patterns?

Um we hope to come back to the council with a full presentation about our.

I know that you are you obviously know um all of our our goals within the AFFH.

Uh, but in this moment, something that we are significantly considering is the testing program.

Um we are not letting up and we'll we have not launched the program, but we will continue to engage in that.

Let me tell you what I'll do.

I'll submit these questions to you, and then you can provide the answers for the fair housing.

Why don't we do that?

So we don't continue to go through these questions that probably better suited for specific housing experts.

Um young man, I'm fine.

Uh, we're gonna move on to counselor who's in now.

We'll give her five minutes to make opening statements.

And if she has questions of you, I'll give her time to ask her questions of you.

And then uh then we'll move on to uh Boston Housing Authority and Virginia Albert.

Virginia.

Virginia.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Counselor.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chair, and thank you to the chief and to uh Council Albert for being with us.

Really appreciate your presence and having you here.

Uh I want to also lift up the incredible work of Bob Terrell for all that he did in sort of making sure that we understood that fair housing and fair housing understanding and uh effectiveness really is dependent on a uh testing program and on the gold standard of paired testing, and so something that I want to make sure that we accomplish is actually having a testing system, whether it be something internal or whether that we do something that's in partnership with uh an outside organization.

I'd like that to, I mean, that is what I believe we've been asking for for the past few years here on the council to make sure that we have paired testing.

Um it's something that Bob Terrell often would would speak on.

You can have um people make claims, but you need to be able to investigate, and that investigation is made stronger, and legal claims are made stronger when you have pair testing.

Um so, Chief, if you could just please describe to me right now what the Office of Fair Housing and Equity, what it currently looks like, what are the who are the current employees, what is the current staff look like?

Yes.

So we have our uh Dwayne Watts, who's our deputy director.

Um we have one, two, three, four investigators.

Soon we will have a director of investigations.

Um Julio is one of our investigators in the team uh who just spoke.

We have Alize A Kerbar, who is our intake special intake um coordinator.

And we as of last Friday, we had uh Joyce Rivera, who was the director of our the coordinator of our AF of H uh program.

And I hope I named everybody at this point.

And AFFH lives in the Office of Fair Housing and Equity.

The coordination of all stakeholders, yes, it lives in that office, even though a lot of it is within sort of the realm of planning.

Yes.

Okay.

Um is the Boston Interagency Fair Housing Development Committee still meeting.

What's the acronym there?

Interagency.

BIFDC.

It's tasked with reviewing developers' submissions for new projects to ensure that they align with the city's fair housing goals as part of um AFFH and zoning.

We we do not own that, but they are still meeting.

They are still meeting.

And then if I'm not mistaken, that's under MOH.

Okay, and do you know if there have been any plan changes, if they have any plan changes or recommendations with respect to Article 80 modernization, like how are they happening in tandem?

I understand that this may not be sort of please record that question.

Okay, I will make sure that I send that question um to the chair.

And I just want to, you know, continue to highlight that obviously we have a federal government that's retreating from fair housing oversight.

Um had uh terminated the 2021 AFFH rule, um, and the president has directed federal agencies to curtail disparate impact enforcement and the administration's proposed eliminating CDBG funding altogether, which would be a travesty for us and would be a travesty for um how we fund our housing needs affordable housing for our most vulnerable communities.

What are you thinking that the city should institutionalize or sustain or or what institutionalize so that this work continues regardless of administration?

So how are we continuing to make sure that this work is happening despite the federal investigations uh that are um that are happening um and uh yeah, what are we doing to ensure that the work continues outside of you know the attacks?

Yeah, um I wanna first state that um the staff and I have had some conversations about uh even their own disappointment about the fact that we have not been able to move forward with the search of of a director.

And why is that what primarily losing an executive director is not somebody that somebody it's not something that somebody walks you through and helps you get through, and it's been a collective grief because Bob Torrell is such an important member of our community.

Um so I'm gonna go ahead and take the take the fault for the first year of delay, and then we've had a hiring freeze for the last six months.

Um so that's something that we are continu we are committed to, and we will we are very close to announcing uh our new director um as well as the director of investigations.

Once we have our new executive director, that person will have the resources to also hire for the person who will be in charge of the coordination of the AFH work as well as the outreach and education program, which we heard is a major recommendation.

Um I cannot speak to sort of like what other things the the city needs to be doing.

I'm I'm hoping that our experts are the ones making those recommendations, but the work is not stopping.

When a voucher oh I oh I sorry, counselor.

I also didn't really formally give an intro.

I didn't have a okay, thank you.

Because I think that was my time for my opening.

Okay, so to make sure you get your questions in.

Thank you.

When a voucher holder reports discrimination today, either to BHA, what like to BHA, for example, do they do they report voucher discrimination directly to the Boston Housing Authority?

Yes.

And what happens?

What is the life of that initial complaint?

What does the BHA do?

Yes, I do have that in my presentation.

Oh, I don't know.

Okay, so we have to get up here for the I'll hold off on that.

Um is there anything like how do we work with the state?

Because oftentimes, you know, the discrimin discrimination when it happens, people are looking.

Maybe they're looking in Boston and then maybe they'll looking in Arlington, Cambridge.

Um Chief, do you know how do we coordinate with the state or what what is the office's vision in coordination with the state to really address fair housing issues?

Um that is something that I would also like an expert to answer um in this moment.

My hope is that our new director will set that vision.

But I knew I know that um I know that under our deputy Dwayne Watts, there has been a lot of uh coordination with HUD, with the regional office in HUD, as well as uh the MCAD at the state, but that's all I can answer at the moment.

Is the deputy here?

No, he is unfortunately in a medical handling a medical emergency.

Okay.

Um I think a lot of my questions are pretty detailed, and I think I would want to have someone who can answer them.

So those are my questions right now.

We were hoping to have him actually just started with that.

We were hoping to have Dwayne Watts here.

We we we we did at one point.

Actually, I actually don't know if that's true.

We have I remember meeting with Bob Terrell on several occasions during my time, and I've been here for now I'm in my fifth year.

Have we had a testing program?

Have we partnered?

You uh have we had one internally or have we partnered to have a testing program externally?

Because I know Suffolk used to have one.

I don't know the status of their testing program, but have we in the city had a testing program?

Not under we've had a lot of leadership turnover in that office, if that's the right word to say.

So uh no, not under the not in the last four and a half years.

And then I guess could I still have someone I I was I was just gathering my notes when I um when I believe counselor callpover was asking questions.

The person from um the investigator, if I could just have him explain the life of an investigation, uh if you can explain that again, that would be really helpful.

And what you know, once you once there is a finding of probable cause, what is the next step?

Yeah, so a uh an investigation begins at uh intake.

Uh our intake unit takes in the allegations of a complaint and establishes jurisdiction for that complaint.

It's then assigned to an investigator who conducts an investigation uh as a FAP agency contracted with HUD.

We are to say, sorry, sorry, can you say that?

Sorry, as a fair housing assistance program contracted with the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Our uh goal is to investigate and issue a finding uh in response to a complaint within a hundred days.

Uh that's if practicable.

Oftentimes the cases will go on longer for one or more reasons uh after a finding, and depending on what that finding is, there is a hearing.

It's either an appeal hearing if we do not find in favor of the complainant, uh, or uh an administrative hearing if we do find in favor of the complainant, and so against the respondents.

Uh it's at that point that uh either party can elect uh an administrative hearing, which is here in City Hall in front of the Boston Fair Housing Commission, or uh opt for civil action, which is with the attorney general's office.

When is the last time that there was a hearing in the Fair Housing Commission?

So I've only been in my in the position for six months now, and um in my time, I don't think I don't know if there has been a hearing.

I I don't schedule the hearings, but I myself as an investigator have not uh forwarded a case for a hearing.

I know that there is one in the works now.

I will say that oftentimes these complaints, even if we do issue a finding of probable cause, meaning that we find uh reason to believe that there may have been discrimination, often don't make it to a hearing because baked into the investigation process from the stage of uh from the beginning to end uh is the idea of settlement or conciliation.

Uh we are empowered to to settle these complaints by either resolving the housing matter at hand, among other things.

Uh, oftentimes before a hearing, either the respondents will often want to settle.

Which closes the complaint and and eliminates the need for a hearing.

Who opts to settle?

Is it the complainant or so either party can can make a proposal?

Uh complainants uh are often making proposals to either resolve their their housing issue or they can also ask for uh a damages, monetary damages.

Uh the office uh will also put in public interest measures into that, which can include monitoring of a uh housing provider's operations, um uh having them rewrite their policies to be less discriminatory, um mandating that they take their housing training, uh among other things.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Thank you, Council.

I just had uh a couple of questions.

Uh you said that a case was being ready for hearing.

That's right.

I believe we have one in the pipeline right now.

And knowing there's no director, who would hear the case?

So the the director of investigations uh does not hear the the cases to begin with.

The the cases No, but who would hear the case?

The the commission.

We don't have a director of the office.

Who would hear the case?

The commission does.

And you can't tell us when the last hearing was held.

Uh I don't know myself, no.

Okay.

I don't have any further questions of you.

Chief, thank you so much for taking the time of your schedule.

We'll submit these questions to you.

Uh and I do want to thank you for making the effort to hire a fair housing director.

I know I've been on you about that.

I do appreciate you kept your word saying that we have one by the end of the summer.

So thank you so much for that.

Looking forward to working with the fair housing director that you're going to announce next week.

Not next week.

The week after.

Sir, I've learned not to share timelines in public anymore.

But you will have one within several weeks.

Several weeks.

Right.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ms.

Albert, you have six minutes.

Good morning.

Um, Counselor Culpepper and Counselor Luis Shin.

Um, thank you for having me this morning.

Um, my name is Virginia Albert.

I am the assistant director of civil rights at Boston Housing Authorities Office of Civil Rights.

Um my role involves investigating housing and employment discrimination cases from BHA residents, applicants, employees, and visitors to our developments.

Um, I also lead the agency's internal affirmatively furthering fair housing initiatives that help implement the assessment of fair having housing that the city um implemented.

BHA's Office of Civil Rights works to implement um our civil rights protection plan, which I believe counselor Culpepper, you helped draft.

Um the plan is to protect applicants, residents, visitors, and employees from threats of harassment, violence or abuse while on BHA property.

Um, we address these allegations completely and expeditiously.

Um BHA is committed to a administering all aspects of um or housing programs free of discrimination based on all protected classes.

Um we have about 16,000 voucher households with our BHA portfolio compared to over 8,000 household in our public housing developments, and so allegations of civil rights violations raised by voucher residents are referred to the Boston Fair Housing Um Commission and the Office of Fair Housing and Equity for investigation.

And so OCR also recommend any voucher holders that reside outside of the city of Boston, given that the jurisdiction of FHE is only for residents within the Boston you know limitations.

So any resident who have vouchers that live outside city lines, we recommend that they contact our colleagues at MCAD or HUD.

Um and so we with BHA, the offices of rights or authority is quite limited when it comes to investigations that come from voucher residents.

We do not have the authority to investigate and adjudicate those allocations, given that they're against private landlords.

BHA acknowledges that the Office of Fair Housing and Equity possess investigatory capabilities compared to those of HUD and trust its abilities to handle discrimination complaints.

And since 2020, BHA has established a protocol with um Fair Housing and Equity to refer complaints received by BHA for voucher residents to FHE, and we have created an intake form that BHA uses to facilitate that process.

Um the earlier um speaker, we through our work with the FFH in 2022 in 2022, BHA was the one that helped introduce housing rights initiative to the Boston and Greater Boston area.

Um and you know, they did the testing that ended up leading to the lawsuit that the previous um speaker spoke about.

Um and we were pleased to see that lawsuit led by lawyers for civil rights, um which was filed in Suffolk Superior Court, alleging that 20 landlords and property management companies discriminated against voucher holders by stating that they do not accept vouchers.

The lawsuit had included screenshots from testers documenting instances where landlords and realtors explicitly stated that vouchers would not be accepted.

Unfortunately, as mentioned, um the lawsuit was dismissed, but we were pleased as BHA to have been at least part of that effort.

BHA also recognizes that there is an information gap that exists from both landlord and residents with vouchers.

Um OCR created a voucher discrimination guide to share with our voucher residents so they can be better equipped to combat misconceptions that landlord may have about vouchers.

In addition, our expanding choice and housing opportunity, also known as ECHO.

Um that team has done extensive work building relationships with landlords and hold regular in-verse sessions to create landlord participation in the program, increase that participation.

The team also conducts engagement sessions, including housing search information sessions, new tenant briefings, workshop for new landlords, and sessions for existing BHA landlords.

Families using vouchers have faced several barriers, including bureaucratic inefficiencies, unaffordable rents, and past evictions, to just name a few.

Residents having to provide first last insecurity deposit is unaffordable.

And BHA's primary strategy for assisting voucher residents with these upfront costs is to request that landlords waive security deposits.

In recent years, BHA has also partnered with nonprofit organizations to provide financial assistance for security deposits and moving costs.

So for example, BHA collaborated with BPS to help eligible voucher residents cover their security deposits.

And for past eviction, OCR has an eviction ceiling guide that we created last summer and has assisted residents in submitting a petition to seal a pass eviction, especially in collaboration with our ECHO program.

Additionally, despite recent laws, current listings still subject residents to additional fees during the housing search process.

And so the recommendation is to increase enforcement against blatantly non-compliant landlords.

Thank you, and I welcome all questions.

Thank you.

Counselor, you have five minutes.

Thank you.

Um I guess um thank you, Director Albert.

Uh what does it look like?

When do you when do you you refer or do you refer cases to the Office of Fair Housing at the AG MCAT or not at all?

Yes.

And so when a voucher resident, you know, calls our office, we do the intake.

Um if the resident indicates that they live within the city of Boston area, we complete the intake form that we have in partnership with um the fair housing office for the city.

And um we obviously we summarize is it the same intake form?

Do you use the same intake form as Office of Fair Housing and Equity?

No, we there is a new they created a intake specifically for the referral process.

Um and so it's a specific intake form just to facilitate the referral.

And we only have that with the city.

We do not have an official referral process with MCAD or HUD.

We normally just um provide that contact information to the resident that is um contacting our office.

Okay.

Um about how many intakes are you do are you seeing a year?

Oh, I do not have the data in front of me.

I I could follow up with a data set if if required.

What do you think like what is there a cycle you get disinformation about intake?

Like how does that how does information about people complaining about discrimination, how does that impact how we do the work?

Yeah.

Um so as I what does it change?

What does it teach you?

What does it force you to internalize?

Yeah, um, so through those complaints, it was why we actually created our guide to begin with through just the questions and just the type of intakes that we were create uh we were receiving.

Um, and as I mentioned, I also lead the internal of like AFFH work for BHA.

And so it was through that process we're able to like in 2022 collaborate with HRI to kind of indicate, like, no, there's a problem in Boston, and so they came and did the testing, which led to the lawsuit.

So it really allows us to do um more advocacy work, um, but we're not in charge of enforcement, unfortunately.

And so the enforcement piece belongs to whom?

It our sister, you know, agencies, so the city, MCAD, HUD, yeah, uh, for for at least for voucher residents.

Um, for our office, we do the cases for public housing residents.

Okay.

Um, all right, thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Those are my questions.

Thank you, counselor.

Uh Ms.

I've got a few questions for you.

You mentioned that you were involved in the suit where laws for civil rights.

Yes, we helped make the introduction that led to that lawsuit.

So BHA was involved in that introduction.

And that was private owners.

Yes.

And you said you don't have the authority to investigate section eight complaints against private owners?

Yes.

So how were you involved in that suit other than the introduction?

That was that was the extent.

Um just want to follow up on uh counselor Louis James's question with regard to when a section eight uh voucher holder comes to you with a complaint that you can handle.

Um what immediately what support do they get or extension does the BHA give them with regard to the uh expiration data that's section eight so they don't lose it?

Yes, so um we do have an internal policy that if you are experiencing um you know discrimination and you have a voucher, they get more time.

So it at least for BHA, we're we're quite mindful uh of that.

So that's for all section eight holders.

As long as they indicate, yeah.

Yes, they just have to because obviously we get the internal information because we complete the intake, um, and so we we pass that along if if it's necessary to their housing specialists.

And is there a time limit or length that you give them to pursue that and pursue that complaint?

I don't have an exact time limit.

I don't believe there one exists, but I might be incorrect.

I could follow up on that question for you.

Yes.

And I do appreciate you referencing that civil rights protection plan that we developed years ago.

Yes.

That was as we result of the case when I filed suit against the city, the Boston Housing Authority, and we settled that case and we put that civil rights protection plan together, and it's good to hear that you're still using it.

Yes, it's our guiding principle.

Yeah, it went national, and uh many housing authorities across the country wanted a copy of it once they heard what happened with that case.

So I appreciate that you're still using it uh because it it was a helpful manual, and we did put a lot of work into it.

Uh if you read the report, uh the qualified renters need not apply, and you saw a reference in the report to a legal strike force, illegal strike to force reference in the investigation itself that and I was trying to I was wondering whether BHA would be part of that legal strike to force that was referenced in the investigation document.

I don't believe BHA has the capacity to be part of any sort of strike force given or position in terms of or interactions with voucher residents and the limitation of the OCR.

Um if there's a recommendation as to what the strike fork would look like, I'm sure BHA will review.

Um I cannot provide a definite answer today, but that maybe could be a question provided.

We'll talk more about it with the second panel.

I don't know if you'll be here I can't.

You'll listen to the second panel, but we'll talk more about it with the second panel.

How does the BHA currently vet the landlords and brokers uh who list on their preferred partner sites to ensure they that they're following fair housing laws?

The question is about vetting?

Right.

How do you know who on that preferred uh neighborhood list is really following the fair housing laws and whether or not they have had fair housing complaints filed against them?

I don't think I have the ability to answer that question only because I'm not too familiar with our vetting process, but you're looking to it because I think it's something that the BHA, if if they don't vet that preferred a partner site, they may want to start looking at who's on their list and looking to see whether or not they have had complaints filed against them, whether complaints are pending, or whether suits are pending.

Um is the BHA collecting data on success rates of voucher holders in different Boston neighborhoods to identify.

Sorry, go ahead.

Um so the huge document that the city adopted has a whole section indicating where discrimination is like most rampant, I believe.

Um the HA, I I don't believe we have Are they collecting?

Are you collecting data now?

I'd have to take a look at the something that if you're not, you may want to begin collecting the data so you can identify whether there's significant discrimination taking place in one part of the city or another part of the city, because that data can be used and be helpful for future lawsuits.

So you may want to start collecting that data.

In the report, it states that BHA should explicitly list encountering discrimination as a reason for voucher extension.

Has this been implemented?

I'm sorry, I was writing when you started the question, so I missed the first half of the question.

The report suggests that the BHA should explicitly list encountering discrimination as a reason for voucher extensions, and has that been implemented?

And if it hasn't, it may want to be something that you might want to implement and then keep data on that also.

And you're you're talking about the goal and the assessment, is that correct?

That's the one you're you're reading.

No, not just the goals, but a voucher holder holder that comes in and they're uh and countering discrimination, whether or not you list that as a reason for the voucher extension.

And if so, if you're not keeping that on it, you may want to begin to keep data.

And and there was discussion earlier, and I think Councilor Louis Jen raised it.

Umlords, uh, do they get any training for from the Boston Housing Authority about discrimination and Section 8 discrimination in particular?

So the landlords who work with our ECHO program, yes, they uh participate in workshops and there's a coverage on what's the echo program the expanding choice and housing opportunity.

Okay, is that the preferred partner site list or is that separate?

Can you are these preferred landlords?

A list of preferred landlords?

No, I the echo program sort of um reaches out globally and tries to work with as many landlords as possible, yeah.

And they're doing training on the stigma associated with when a landlord works with BHA with the the echo program, yes.

Okay.

And with the source of income being protect a protected class in Massachusetts, what specific warning signs should housing authorities report to commissions when they see higher rates of voucher denials and certain zip codes.

The warning signs, that's the question.

What's the yeah?

I don't believe I have an answer for that question.

And so as you identify um source of income issues, the the question and maybe the recommendation to you is that you you might start referring those sources of income issues if you see them in a specific specific zip code to the commissions that are overseeing those.

We do currently refer those cases.

Okay, okay.

And are you keeping data?

I I'm not really sure.

I don't I don't do the data, so but I can I can definitely follow up on the data questions.

And if you don't, you may want to recommend it that keep data because that data can give you real information about where Section 8 discrimination is taking place, what landlords have historically been sued or complaints filed against them for discrimination.

And as you look at your echo program list and as you look at the preferred partner sites, you can begin if there are some on there to deal with that in a different way than you are right now.

Uh I guess that's all I have for your counselor.

No additional questions, thank you.

Thank you, Miss Albert.

Thank you so much for your time.

Introduce the second panel, uh Andrew Espinosa, Deputy Chief of Investigations for MCAD, Sonia Gupta.

Sonia is an associate vice president of community wealth, Boston Foundation.

Thank you.

Coming Kelly Vieira.

Kelly is a visiting assistant professor, former director of investigations and outreach.

She's at Suffolk University Law School Center for Housing and Policy and Ashley Grant, Director of Fair Housing Enforcement, Suffolk Unity Law School, Center for Housing Justice and Policy.

Thank you all for uh coming to participate as we look at this report and how we move forward from this report, especially with regard to updates and issues that have been identified since the report.

We know the report is a few years old, but let's talk about uh and and you each have six minutes.

Uh let's talk about the report and what you're seeing.

Uh and I'm sure you have better information.

Uh since the report was issued.

And so Ashley, Grant, you want to start with you, and then we'll move to Kelly, and then we'll sign your Gupta and then Andrew Espinosa.

You each will have six minutes.

Counselor Culpepper, if it's okay, I'm gonna have my colleague Kelly start because she's gonna give you a little bit of context about the testing that happened immediately after this report.

Great, great.

Any other changes than what I just said.

Great.

Kelly, you've got six minutes.

Thank you, Counselor.

Good morning, Councillor Culpepper, Counselor Louijen, and all members of the Boston City Council.

My name is Kelly Vieira.

I'm a resident of the City of Boston, and I previously served as the Director of Investigations and Outreach at Suffolk University Law School's housing discrimination testing program, which has now expanded and has a new name, the Center for Housing Justice and Policy.

I want to ensure assure the council that despite the name change, Suffolk Laws Testing Program continues to go strong as it has since around 2012.

We continue to test.

Also against black renters in the Boston Metro rental market.

That data provided a light on what many residents of Boston already knew that this sort of discrimination, housing discrimination is not a thing of the past, but rather something that continues to happen to this day.

It's a very real and current problem.

In response to the alarming findings that were exposed in the in the research study, the city of Boston funded a dedicated testing project to examine both voucher and race-based discrimination in the city of Boston within City of Boston limits.

I'm here today because I was the one who personally oversaw that project from start to finish.

And that project occurred approximately two years from 2020 to 2022.

I want to begin by saying that the city's investment in that project is what made the work possible at all.

Federal funding cannot be used when it comes to voucher-based discrimination or enforcement.

And when it comes to state funding, it remains limited and inconsistent.

Without the city's support, we would not have been able to investigate these two most common forms of discrimination through our fair housing work.

And I also want to emphasize that this project was a partnership with the Office of Fair Housing and Equity under a previous director, Will O'Noah.

And this was a partnership that we had with the city to conduct testing on the city's behalf.

Throughout this city-funded project, we conduct conducted targeted tests across multiple neighborhoods.

We tested different brokers and property managers and landlords.

What we found was deeply concerning, but unfortunately not surprising based on what the study found.

So here's what we saw.

We saw that voucher holders were ignored or ghosted.

We saw renters being told that units were no longer available if they had a voucher, but testers who did not have vouchers were invited to view those same units.

We saw different requirements being imposed on voucher holders.

For example, voucher holders would be told that there were higher income requirements.

They would be asked for additional documentation.

They would be told statements like the owner doesn't take section eight.

Each of the women that I sent, the testers had identical financial profiles.

They were looking at the same rental properties, they had very similar, if not the same, rental histories and housing preferences, and they all asked about apartments that were available in this large complex.

Across all tests, and I ran multiple tests of the same building.

The white testers who had names like Anne, Sarah, and Jill were consistently receiving better customer service, and were told more information about the apartments available than our black testers who had names like La Toya, Ebony, and Temika.

In every test of that same building, the white tester was shown more units than the black tester.

The tests also uncovered a pattern and how incentives were communicated to testers based on race.

White testers were told about rent specials, free months of rent, free parking, while black testers either were not told about this information at all, or the information was buried in an email that they received after the tour.

And one particularly striking example, our tester named Anne, was offered savings that would total up to $4,440 through a combination of rent specials, getting a free first month of rent and free parking spot for the year.

These were things that the property manager offered Anne.

Then we had LaToya tour the same exact apartment, and none of these things were offered to Latoya.

We also saw that block testers were told about background checks and even something like a sex offenders check, which our white testers were not told about at all.

No, continue.

No, no.

I will be brief and uh summing things up.

These are just some examples of what we saw testers going through.

And we really want to emphasize to the city that funding matters in that voucher discrimination remains per se pervasive.

It disproportionately harms disabled renters, families with children, low-income households, and because federal funding cannot be used to do voucher discrimination work, city funding isn't supplemental for testing programs, it's foundational.

We need the city funding.

If Boston wants to prevent this sort of discrimination, it's critical that the city invests in testing, enforcement, and education.

And without this local funding, programs like ours, testing programs that have so much experience finding this evidence of discrimination will not be able to continue doing this really important work.

So I thank you for your attention on this issue, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

What we'll do is we'll hold questions until the end of all of your presentations.

And then we'll start with Council of Louisiana with questions.

Thank you.

We've got six minutes.

Thank you for holding this hearing and elevating this really important issue.

I want to, and my name is Ashley.

I'm the director of Fair Housing Enforcement for the Center for Housing Justice and Policy at Suffolk, and I want to briefly say a little bit more about what CHJP, which is what we call it, what we do.

As Kelly mentioned, we conduct testing that illuminates patterns of discrimination and can be used in investigative reports and to impact policy.

We also train housing authorities and community organizations and providers to recognize housing discrimination and what to do when they see it and where to refer it, how to make referrals to us.

And we provide free legal representation to victims of discrimination.

That can include informal advocacy, filing complaints with the Mass Commission Against Discrimination, or with local city organizations like the Boston Commission.

And we provide full representation in housing court for discriminatory evictions and affirmative cases in superior court.

So we prevent discriminatory evictions and ensure that voucher holders and other members of protected classes can access the housing that they need because what we've learned is that in the middle of a housing crisis, it's very difficult for someone to also navigate bringing a complaint without receiving assistance.

And I want to talk a little bit more about what this testing means for the residents of Boston because it's one thing to identify discrimination in the abstract.

I think we all know that discrimination happens in the city of Boston, but this is also real people that we're talking about.

And so I just want to tell you about a couple of the folks that the CHJP has helped to illustrate what this kind of discrimination really looks like for folks in the greater Boston area.

One of our clients was a disabled veteran who had a what we call a HUD VASH voucher, which is a voucher that is specific, it's like a Section 8 voucher, but with additional services for veterans.

He was losing his housing and at risk of homelessness, and he found an apartment that he applied for, but he was denied because they said he didn't meet the rent to income ratio.

But this client had a voucher that was going to cover the vast majority of rent.

And so he should not have been denied for that reason.

We conducted testing when he contacted us and found that that was a regular practice of this building.

We promptly filed an MCAD complaint on his behalf, and we were able to get him into that housing and to have that housing provider change their policies so that they were no longer requiring that rent to income ratio of voucher holders.

Another one of our clients was a family that was living in a homeless shelter with their six-month-old, and they received a home-based subsidy, which is to help families transitioning out of shelter.

They were thrilled to get this subsidy and to be able to move out of shelter.

They had been anxiously trying to do that.

They were vigilantly searching for housing, and we all know how difficult that is in the city of Boston and around the city of Boston.

They found an apartment and were accepted, but when the landlord found out that they had home base and were required to, he was required to provide a lead certificate showing that the unit was led safe for children under six.

He would not have a certificate for that apartment, and the family could not move in.

They had to remain in the homeless shelter another six weeks with their six-month-old baby.

They contacted us, we were able to contact the attorney for the landlord, and have them require them to get a lead certificate.

That family was able to move in, and that unit now has a lead certificate so that it's available for families with children.

So these are just a couple of stories, but this happens every day in the city of Boston.

We the tighter the housing market is, the easier it is for landlords to discriminate.

We know we have an incredibly tight housing market right now.

And the people who really pay that price are people of color, voucher holders, people with disabilities.

We get over 300 calls or nearly 300 calls a year to our intake complaint line, and we can only help a fraction of those.

So there was just a lawsuit filed yesterday by the Massachusetts Fair Housing Center against HUD for what they believe will be restrictions on the ability of any organizations, fair housing organizations to get federal funding to fight discrimination.

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts also recently ended its funding for the Fair Housing Alliance of Massachusetts, of which CHJP was a part.

So we will no longer come January 1st.

We will no longer have that funding from the state.

And this work is more important than ever.

Our voucher holders, our residents, having a voucher can be a huge opportunity for people and can do a lot to undo those patterns of segregation in our communities, but not if people are not able to use their voucher.

So I would encourage the city of Boston to continue making these commitments to ensure that we can keep doing this work, keep doing this testing and doing this enforcement.

Thank you so much.

No, thank you.

Sonia.

Am I pronouncing it right?

It's Sony.

Sony.

Yes.

We have six minutes.

Thank you, Counselor Culpepper, Counselor Lugen.

I'm Sony Gupta, Associate Vice President of Community Wealth at the Boston Foundation.

And I also want to say I'm joined by my colleague Sam Chambers, public affairs manager in the audience here.

The Boston Foundation is the community foundation for Greater Boston.

Our mission is to close the gap on this region's greatest disparities and to help build a better Boston.

I know this study needs no more introduction, but I want to say anyway that in 2020, the Boston Foundation partnered with Suffolk University Law Schools, formerly known housing discrimination testing program and the analysis group on that how groundbreaking study that documented widespread discrimination against black renters and voucher holders in Greater Boston's rental housing market.

You all know that the study found high levels of discrimination existed throughout the rental application, including pre-rental application process against both black people and individuals using vouchers, beginning with the very first interaction between the prospective tenant and the person advertising housing.

Black fair housing testers faced great discrimination in 72% of interactions.

Fair housing testers who said they had a housing voucher faced discrimination in 86% of interactions, and nationwide discrimination on the basis of disability, housing voucher status, and race are the most common forms of housing discrimination.

Although the study was released in 2020, there's clear evidence that rental voucher discrimination remains a persistent barrier to housing access in greater Boston, despite being illegal under Massachusetts law.

As Gillian Lenson from LCR pointed out, the Housing Rights Initiative filed a lawsuit in Suffolk Superior Court in 2024 against 20 greater Boston landlords and real estate agents, alleging that they unlawfully refused to rent to prospective tenants because they used housing vouchers.

Yet we know that housing vouchers are highly effective at reducing homelessness, housing instability and overcrowding, and at improving other outcomes for families and children.

In addition to administering federal Section 8 vouchers, Massachusetts is only one of a handful of states that also funds a state rental voucher program known as MRVP.

And every year, housing advocates and coalitions ask for an increase in state funding for MRVP so that more families can receive housing assistance.

The Boston Foundation has supported all of these efforts because we know the power of rental vouchers in furthering housing equity, affordability, and stability.

However, we need to address that the discrimination that is undermining the use of rental voucher programs and limiting the impact of our collective investments in them.

Housing advocates have pushed for legislation at the state level, and on February 12th of this year, the Senate passed Massachusetts Senate Bill S2947 titled An Act Regarding Fair Housing Practices in the Commonwealth, and it is pending with houseways and means.

The bill mandates fair housing training for real estate professionals, increases licenses, license suspensions for repeat discrimination offenses, and expands public reporting of complaints.

Under existing law, only the MCAD is authorized to refer cases to the board for suspension, and the bill will allow for three additional agencies that would be authorized to refer cases to the board, including the Boston Fair Housing Commission.

So the City of Boston has a critical role in preventing identifying and responding to housing discrimination.

As again, my colleagues have said, the important parts are enforcement, which include conducting compliance testing, help with reporting of complaints to ensure that agencies like the Boston Fair Housing Commission and legal organizations have sufficient capacity, and then education and outreach for real estate professionals and landlords on fair housing issues and also for tenants on their rights and the avenues for reporting discrimination.

Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak here.

Thank you.

Mr.

Spinoza.

You have six minutes.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Councillor Kalpefer, Commissioner Lujan, the entire committee for holding this hearing on such an important topic.

I find it really striking that the report is now I think six years old.

And it still continues to foster these conversations.

It's, I mean, the impact that the report had was groundbreaking at the time, but the importance of this work has not been diminished at all.

This is one of the most common types of discrimination that exists anywhere in this country when it comes to housing.

Before I get into some stabs that I have about public assistance discrimination, as we call it on the state level.

It was a really impactful project during the time that I was involved in it.

MCAD, as you hopefully already know, is the state civil rights agency.

We enforce civil rights law throughout the Commonwealth.

We have our main office right here in Boston.

And those civil rights laws include the state's fair housing laws.

State law recognizes within Fair Housing 18 distinct protected classes, protected categories, and that includes, as I stated before, public assistance, which is how voucher discrimination is referred to as a protected class in state law.

Within my division, we have our dedicated fair housing unit, which is one of the units that I manage in my current role.

That unit is comprised of a director, six full-time fair housing investigators, and administrative support staff.

Our process in a nutshell is pretty similar to the gentleman who spoke before on behalf of FHE.

We are a FAP agency, a fair housing assistance program.

Most FAP agencies process is pretty similar.

But just to resume what he had said to summarize, we have our process starts at intake.

Intake is basically when the complaint is received by the agency.

We have different channels.

It could be through the mail, it could be during an in-person interview that we conduct with the person.

And then we also have a our regulations were just updated a few weeks ago.

So we have a new online filing portal that currently is open to attorneys, but within the next few weeks, we anticipate we're going to be allowing non-attorneys to file their own complaints directly with the agency without having to go through an interview process if they don't want to.

So we're expanding access virtually to allow people, especially in the more rural parts of the state that have less access to visit an MCD office.

So during our investigative process, basically we take in the complaint, we ask the responding party, the respondent to respond to the complaint.

We collect evidence, we conduct interviews, sometimes we do on-site investigations depending on what has been filed.

We also have our ADR unit, which conducts mediations, especially on housing cases.

We do try to conduct mediations on as many cases as possible.

And then we also have within the MCD our training unit that is chiefly responsible for community outreach.

So they attend trainings and outreach events on fair housing issues and other anti-discrimination events throughout the state.

They also have their own suite of trainings, such as know your rights trainings for people that are voucher holders or other types of people that are entering the rental market, and they conduct landlord trainings on their civil rights obligations, their fair housing obligations.

At the end of an investigation, if the case hasn't settled, there's two routes, as was explained by the gentleman from FHE.

There could be either a probable cause finding, which means there's sufficient evidence to move the case forward, or there could be a lack of probable cause finding, in which case the case is dismissed, and then there's the opportunity for an appeal.

It's called a conciliation.

If conciliation isn't successful, then it gets what's called certified.

And once it's certified to public hearing, then that's when there's an actual administrative enforcement process that's before one of our hearing officers, or at times before a member of our commission, but it's generally before one of our full-time hearing officers.

Housing cases are unique under state law in that if there is a probable cause finding, the respondent has the ability to remove that case to court at that time.

And due to that, I want to discuss briefly our certain community partnerships that we have.

So the first thing I'll discuss is we have a partnership with the attorney general's office.

They have uh they share some jurisdiction over fair housing enforcement.

Um, and that's a very specific area is that when the respondent chooses to go to court, we refer those cases to the attorney general office's civil rights division, and they handle either more settlement attempts or if settlements unsuccessful, prosecution on behalf of the complainant and the commonwealth.

Um we also have uh long-standing relationships with um private fair housing legal advocacy organizations, um, including FIP agencies such as Suffolk, Mass Fair Housing Center, which is in Western Mass, South Coast Fair Housing is in the South Coast region.

Um we routinely will request testing from some of these FIP organizations, such as Suffolk, um, and they will refer their testing results back to us, and we can evaluate whether we can add that to the complaint or sometimes we will even file a commission initiated complaint based on evidence like that that we found without a flesh and blood complainant.

Basically, our commissioner can stand in for a complainant.

Um we haven't done a uh public assistance um commission initiated complaint that I'm aware of, but we did one last year based on uh assistance animals, like a support animal.

That was a disability fair housing case.

Um we also um there's a new state office that I wanted to mention because it's of interest to this topic.

It's called um the State Office of Fair Housing.

It's housed within the executive office of um uh EOHLC, housing and liberal communities.

They have this new long name.

Um, but they are a I think of them kind of as like a statewide fair housing clearinghouse.

They they are coordinating funding for private fair housing organizations, and they're also doing a lot of statewide um awareness campaigns.

Like, for example, I participated with them on a series of um fair housing listening sessions all throughout the state um last year and into early this year, and I think that office has a potential for for really good impact in terms of raising awareness on these topics.

Um, in terms of what MCD is actually seeing, um I I kept these stats to FY26 because I wanted them to be as recent as possible.

Um in FY26, um, MCAD received um 655 um fair housing claims which were filed with our office.

Um out of those 655 claims, the five um top most commonly filed protected categories were uh disability, retaliation, public assistance, which is includes voucher and national origin.

Um so public assistance, therefore, was our fourth most frequently filed claim type in FY26.

Um and that represented 70 claims of public assistance discrimination that were filed um during that fiscal year.

And then narrowing that data even further, um 30% of those cases.

So it was 21 out of the 70 were cases that um dealt with uh respondents whose properties were in Boston.

So, you know, just from that data alone, I mean, obviously it's affected by the fact that Boston's our largest urban area, but a huge chunk of these cases, 30% of these cases statewide are originating just within the city of Boston.

Um I want to mention though, disability is year in and year out, our most commonly filed claim type, um, especially with uh reasonable accommodation denials and service animal support animal cases.

Um we're dedicated to this work.

Um it's not without its challenges.

Um, keep going, you can finish.

Um, I mentioned this data, it's a large number of cases, it's hundreds of fair housing cases that are filed every year, thousands of cases overall that um, you know, a challenge that we perennially have to deal with is is managing these cases with a relatively small staff, um, even though we are a state agency.

Um we've been committed to revamping our processes in the last year plus, which includes the updating of our regulations to be able to have um we have a new mechanism for looking at these cases, um, evaluating them much sooner than was possible generally.

We're hoping to be able to get action investigations happening much sooner than than has been done previously under this new model that we're adopting with the new regs.

Um we also have historically relied on federal funding, which uh my colleagues have mentioned is a challenge for all um fair housing agencies, FIP FAP, etc.

Um the state has given us level funding for the first time.

It's not an increase in funding, but it is funding now to represent the money that um we would have relied on from the federal government because of what's going on federally.

We don't know if we're going to be able to rely on HUD, for example, paying us the money that they've paid us yearly for our cases as in the past.

Um PUD is is not in a good place right now.

I I think everyone in this chamber probably knows that, but they've been actively rolling back support animal protections.

Um they're no longer recognizing vital protected classes such as gender identity, which used to be able to be recognized under a claim of sex.

Um they're withdrawing guidance in general that agencies like ours relied on to look for how to do our work and best practices.

And as I think was also mentioned, um, grants as of a recent announcement seem to be made now subject to complying with Trump's uh 2025 executive orders, such as um not using your resources to promote DEI.

Um and I won't get into that, but that is an athema to our mission, and so any question of applying for a HUD grant, for example, which could be used to support a testing program in the future for now with that that money's out of the question.

Um I could keep going on.

Um I know I'm over time.

I will end it there.

Um I thank you so much for your time, and I thank you so much for raising this topic in this forum.

Thank you.

Uh Counselor, you have five minutes.

Thank you so much.

And thank you to all the panelists for your testimony.

Um I guess my my first question is for Professor Vieira.

Um, when you laid out sort of the testing program, what I missed was has Suffolk University ever been contracted with the city to do testing work?

Yes.

And what and when was the last time that that I believe the last time we were contracted was either late 2022 or early 2023.

Right and that was to do the pair testing that you had talked discussed.

And for what time period and for for and for what purpose so the purpose was to essentially take what we found in the study and see what we found specifically in the city of Boston.

The study covered the metro Boston area so it included places that were not in the city.

So the city of Boston contracted us through OFHE to do testing in Boston proper and I did 100 tests and that was a where I was able to find that that evidence of discrimination and then we did do kind of a follow-up where I believe it was either 75 to 100 more tests where one of my colleagues took over and that I believe went into 2023 and that's when our partnership that was the the scope of the partnership.

And do you know what what what what happened as a result of that of the data that you gained yes so uh it wasn't just because it wasn't a research study it was meant for enforcement um several complaints were filed through OFHE leading to uh gosh I wish I had the number of of the total amount of settlement I believe it was over 7000 in settlements total came from testing specifically that I did um through this project so the uh OFHE would uh initiate uh complaints and those complaints largely settled um two different amounts and that money would either go back to the city or some might come back to us for further testing and then in cases where there was a live person who was the complainant they would receive that settlement money.

And is there a schedule of fines or fees somewhere like either in fact does anyone know in federal legislation state legisl uh about fair housing and what what what is that's what are those scheduled fines.

Yeah so there are fines both under um 151b that MCAD and Andrew can probably speak to this per fair housing violation and then there's um so and there's also under the federal law there are uh civil penalties and when we bring um our office often brings cases as Andrew mentioned to MCAD that then get um removed and we partner with the attorney general's office and the attorney general can request those civil penalties and I believe uh it's 5,000 per incident of discrimination that the state can can find as civil penalties and Andrew I don't know if you can speak more to what the commission can uh what penalties the commission can ask for but so the actual numbers I don't have the schedule offhand I do believe they increase if it's not the first violation though.

Yes.

But then um if there is an actual complaint and so it's not a commission initiated complaint um there can also be an award of emotional distress damages um I'm trying to remember um what other type of lost housing opportunity out of pocket expenses.

Yeah and um and if they are uh represented by counsel there can be attorneys fees that are awarded as well by our commission great um thank you um and how often are affirmative lawsuits filed I I know there was some mention of a few but how often do you see that happening either in superior court or um so I can say that my office right now we have currently four cases in superior court that we are litigating with the attorney general's office um we have a number of cases with MCAD um we have a couple of housing uh cases in housing court so we sort of have them all all over I think our housing court cases are probably uh summary process so they're not affirmative but the affirmative that was my next question so you're using it it's it you're involved in cases in housing court where you bring up uh discrimination as a defense as or as a counterclaim exactly yes um and what like it's like either a no fault eviction or fault eviction non payment and you allege as a counterclaim what form of discrimination I mean it wouldn't be sort of because they're already living in the yeah so sometimes it may be there may be a claim uh a counterclaim of discrimination where for example um the client has fallen behind in arrears but is trying to use raft um and the landlord is refusing to accept a raft payment okay um or they're being um they're being evicted because they have uh an animal but it's actually an assistance animal that they um need due to their disability and so there would be a counterclaim for discrimination based on that thank you um I I believe that's my time but um I just I just wanted to thank you all I this is a very challenging time to be working in the important work of your housing we and the city have become a target because of our commitment to uh routing out uh discrimination based on voucher uh race uh um I generity and so I think that it's important for us to recognize that this is not an easy moment and so

Thank you.

Um I I believe that's my time, but um I just I just wanted to thank you all.

I this is a very challenging time to be working in the important worker fair housing.

We and the city have become a target because of our commitment to uh routing out uh discrimination based on voucher uh race, uh gender identity, and so I think that it's important for us to recognize that this is not an easy moment, and so I want to appreciate all the work that you're doing, aside from sort of the federal government uh retreating from um the affirmatively fair housing or from being like a uh steadfast partner in uh trying to route out discrimination.

What do you think is missing in the city of Boston from the fair housing framework?

Imagine that we were sort of not dealing with the federal government as is, um, what is missing from the framework?

And then I do have a second question about how do we compare to other cities.

I always want to think about sort of that that dynamic as well.

I mean, I can always say I'm always going to vouch for more testing.

Um the there is research kind of nationally to show that cities that have a greater presence of discrimination testing see a decrease in discrimination because the housing providers know that they're essentially potentially being watched to be on their better behavior.

So, you know, I think if Boston has a robust, uh more robust testing presence, that in itself would have a positive effect just in terms of deterrence, but also discrimination is hard to prove without testing.

So for a lot of folks, they they believe they were discriminated against.

They often were, but it's hard for them to show concrete evidence in the way that testing can.

Um so that would be my pitch for and and testing requires funding, it is an expensive thing to do.

Um so that would be my suggestion.

Yeah, I would just echo obviously what Kelly is saying, and and also say, you know, funding for testing and funding for enforcement.

You know, although we do have um the Boston Fair Housing Commission, as I said, and I think as Kelly was making the point, it's sometimes very difficult to bring cases without testing evidence.

Um but also it's it's hard to put that on the backs of the victims of discrimination.

To go through that alone, it can be a long process, particularly if they don't have representation.

And the idea when we bring cases, what we're looking for is not only to try to make the victim of discrimination whole again, but also to get affirmative changes from those landlords.

So a change in their policy, um, you know that to ensure that this isn't gonna happen again, and the more we do that, and the more it's um that we get results that aren't just a slap on the wrist, um, the more we get substantial damages for our clients and substantial injunctive relief, meaning big policy changes, and that that gets attention.

Um, the less discrimination I think we're gonna see in the city.

So just echoing the need we have to have funding to be able to do that work.

So um, so I would echo what Kelly said in funding for testing and enforcement.

I I just I completely that I think Suffolk has been such a terrific partner on identifying that and and the MCAD and um in um sort of the discrimination claims.

Um I also think that uh we just need to have more vouchers available, period.

Um it's a critical fight for affordability and for those vouchers, of course, to work.

We need to make sure that there isn't discrimination.

But I you know just remind everybody that um there aren't enough vouchers to go around.

It's one in four families that are eligible that receive a voucher.

So um that is also a core fair housing issue.

I would also just say that um awareness that voucher discrimination, the public assistance discrimination is still illegal on the local and state level is very, very important.

There's been a lot of rhetoric from HUD from the federal government also in the recent months that you know HUD is no longer going to be trying to do anything about voucher discrimination.

A lot of people take that at face value, which and think that uh voucher discrimination is now legal in Massachusetts, it's not in the city of Boston, it's not, but every year we see cases where the landlord tries to defend against a complaint by saying that you know they're not doing anything illegal.

These small time landlords, especially a lot of them legitimately don't know just that these protections are out there, but then conversely the the voucher holders don't know, and so even if they have the ability to pursue their claims, they they don't know that they can.

Yeah, so I think increased awareness and and public training either from the city or you know, my office will continue with what it's been doing.

I I think that's needs to be always happening.

Well, that's great because the things that I've been fighting for, paired testing from the the gold standard from the very beginning.

We always are fighting for more vouchers, and I do think Bob Torrell um always advocated for once you have a robust office, you have to do the work of education campaigns to make people know that discrimination uh against voucher holders, all types of fair housing discrimination is illegal.

So um I wanted to thank you for your work, and then I guess the INE other cities that are doing pair testing well.

Oh, any other cities?

Any and do you know any cities that are doing this well?

Yeah, yeah, I would say new work comes to mind.

Um New York has very robust testing, and they've had a lot of success, kind of speaking to what Ashley mentioned earlier with um getting large damage amounts to the point where it's not just a slap on the wrist that the you know the housing provider might consider a cost of business, that's always our worry.

If it's you know hundreds of thousands of dollars, that sends a bigger message.

Yeah, and we're seeing that more often in New York.

Um that's great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Those are my questions.

Thank you, uh Council.

I've got a few questions.

I wanted to first thank you for all the work that you do and how significant and challenging it can be, especially in these times when money is starting to dry up and let me ask you something.

So we know this information is six years old.

Do you think it's time and Sony and and Kelly or Ashley or Andrew, any of you can answer this?

Do you think it's time for a new round of testing to take place to really focus on uh what's taking place so that if there are legal organizations ready to file suit, they would need fresh information, and that I guess everyone seems to be agreeing, but Sony, you want to talk about it?

Well, I'll say that um we are always interested in testing, and um we continue to use testing as um a possibility to identify discrimination in other areas as well.

Um so we absolutely believe in the power of testing, as you can see.

This report, six years old, it led to a coalition.

I mean, we're here at this hearing, it led to a coalition being formed against housing discrimination that came up with that legislation at the state level and continues to advocate for policies and programs that will um that will help uh you know fight discrimination.

Um I so uh you know, can't say enough good things about testing, especially the way that Suffolk um carries it out.

It is a long process, and it's uh incredibly detailed, and I'm always amazed at the thoughtfulness that um with which it's carried out, and I think we need to be doing things alongside the testing.

So perhaps collecting data on the number of complaints and you know the the various stages of enforcement and learning.

I think that certainly has been on my mind uh this entire morning is perhaps it's a compilation of data from all of the various agencies that are involved on um cases and other things that have evolved since then, and perhaps we turned to testing again at a suitable time um when to sort of see how the city is done.

Is the Boston Foundation prepared to fund another round of testing?

I mean, we got a hundred thousand dollars in this last budget, uh, and that was the best we could do, but we were glad to get that hundred thousand dollars.

There's money for testing that's for uh fiscal year 2026 money that's there, but we were glad to get the hundred thousand dollars for 2027.

Is the Boston Foundation ready or prepared to fund another?

We would absolutely be open to a conversation, and like I said, we without saying too much, we are still very much um uh in the realm of using testing, and um I'll just leave it at that to say that we're we're we're part we're uh looking at it and our participating in it um and would definitely be open to a conversation about the need um for future testing, absolutely.

Absolutely.

And and I think Kelly, you mentioned um that there's still significant discrimination against voucher holders in the city of Boston.

And I know you did work after the testing.

Yes.

Exactly.

What did you do?

So my role was I was the director of investigations and outreach.

So part of my role was the education work that I think Andrew talked about, going into the community, teaching people about their rights so they understand that being turned away for your voucher is illegal.

Um I continue to do more testing throughout my work as director.

Um I did testing outside of the city of Boston, so in other parts of Massachusetts, um, though continuing to test in Boston.

I've done testing for I think every protected class at least once.

Um so I was doing testing related to disability and national origin, uh race, uh gender identity, you know, and all anything that you can name kind of.

I I did a bit of it.

Um, candidly, the I am no longer with CHGP, I miss it.

Um, but on a personal level, the reason why I couldn't continue doing fair housing work is because my position was largely HUD funded.

And you know, as a young professional, the lack of stability in my career was kind of something that pushed me towards towards academia where I am now.

So that just goes to show like it had a real tangible effect the the funding challenges that we still continue to face.

How how much education and our reach are you doing now?

Uh so I am a full-time educator now.

Um I work at Suffolk still, but I am a uh visiting assistant professor, I work with the law students.

Um I do fair housing education in my spare time.

So I actually go into my own neighborhood.

I live in Brighton and I've done know your rights trainings just for like my neighbors every once in a while.

Um but yeah, fair housing isn't my full-time job anymore for the past year, largely because of funding.

So you're just teaching now?

Yes.

What are you teaching?

Uh I teach uh I'm in the academic support program, so I do a lot of foundational work for the law students.

Okay.

But Suffolk continues to do the Center for Housing Center.

Education and outreach, yes, that's um, and testing.

Although we desperately miss Kelly, we do drag her back often.

Ashley, how much education work are you doing in the Roxy Dorchester Medipan area?

So right now, um I'm trying to think of which I'm just thinking of our funding because you know, a lot of what education and outreach we can do is determined by what funding we have in the moment.

So um so I off the top of my head cannot remember whether we have any funding specific to Boston right now.

Um we are doing education and outreach um in terms of we are sort of constantly doing um education outreach for housing providers, um uh housing authorities in particular and community organizations, we will always continue to do that.

Um I would say we probably do um you know a training every couple weeks, maybe, but um in the greater not all directed within the city of Boston just because of how our funding is um and andrew 655 fair housing claims are filed in fiscal year 26?

Correct.

And how many of those 65 complaints went to hearing?

Sorry.

Can you break down how many went to hearing, how many settled, how many uh probable cause was found on and moved to superior court?

What's the breakdown of that 655?

I don't have that data in front of me now.

I only pulled the data about uh filings for the fiscal year, unfortunately, but if you um request it for the Can you look at that and just see how many went to court, how many went to hearing within MCAD, and how many you actually found probable cause on.

I can speak generally about the way that our cases move, um, not specific to this data set, if that's okay.

Um our cases tend um there's uh the lack of probable cause rate is every year about 70 to 75 percent.

That's when we don't have sufficient evidence to move the case forward.

Forward right.

Um about another 20 percent are probably 20, 25 percent are probable cause.

Um and within those probable cause findings, the amount that settle after probable cause is pretty high.

So it's kind of like a narrowing um rate of what actually makes it to public hearing or to court.

Um, because even if the respondent elects to go to court, the attorney general's office will make additional settlement attempts.

Yeah.

Um I think that last year um I was just told these studs yesterday.

I think that our hearing officers heard two housing related public hearings last year.

Out of the 655.

That was just in general.

Those cases could have been filed prior to fiscal 26.

Okay.

Um, but yeah, uh many, many cases settle.

Um a lot of cases, unfortunately, are dismissed for lack of probable cause.

Very few actually make it to public hearing or to court.

Okay.

I've got a few more questions, but we have one person signed up to testify in Zoom.

I'm gonna go to this person.

I'll give them gonna give them their two minutes.

Then I've got a few other questions for if you have time.

Great, thank you.

Uh-oh.

T Lawrence Ware.

You have two minutes.

Can you hear me?

We can hear you, but we can't see you.

We can hear you.

All right, I'm I'm trying to turn on the camera now.

Okay.

Uh-huh.

I hopefully you can see me now.

No, we see some interesting figures.

Oh.

We can have no idea.

All right, so let me proceed.

Um concerning housing choice vouchers, there's been oh, here I am now.

There's been a few incidents where people have been pre-approved to move into a property.

And then they get the reference call from the previous landlord whom they've taken to court in one, their previous landlord will disparage them in a way that would make the new landlord uh proceed board with their uh application.

I'm asking based on this particular scenario, is there a way that Boston or the Commonwealth of Massachusetts could institute a program, do a program where references have to be done via email or some sort of print service, whereas if there is something disparaging, say it it could be tracked and monitored.

And then uh like in the city of Philadelphia, they have something called the renter certificate.

To expand that further than just having the property inspected, could the city of Boston come over to program, whereas the landlords have to attend the class concerning discrimination, and the people with H with an ACV housing choice voucher also are provided with the information to help themselves when they are a victim of discrimination, because currently, right now, if you call Boston Housing Authority and say, hey, I've been discriminated against, it's very difficult to get to the right person to help you and navigate for you.

And I yield back the rest of my time.

Thank you, Mr.

Ware.

Would any of the panelists like to address Mr.

Ware's question?

I guess I I would just say, you know, we did recently get the eviction ceiling law passed, and that's something that our office has been um doing some training and education and outreach around.

Because I do think that you know, we know that having an eviction on your record is a huge barrier to housing for a lot of folks and um a lot of voucher holders.

Um there is the ability now to seal that record, so at the very least, landlords can't um you know do a screen where they're checking in sort of regardless of whether you were in the wrong or not in the eviction case, they're just seeing that there was a case in court and they're eliminating you.

So the eviction ceiling act, I I think is helping that a little bit.

It doesn't address um the issue, I believe was Mr.

Wells um raised of references.

I think that's um is is can be really hard, also, particularly where there has been some conflict with the landlord.

Um but that's you know, in terms of the eviction ceiling, that's what I'd say.

Thank you.

Any anyone else?

I can speak in part to um my prior role with uh the Office of Fair Housing and Equity.

There were discussions during the pandemic about having potentially uh a mandatory fair housing testing program for landlords coordinated with ISD.

Um nothing came of that during my time.

Um I'm not sure of any current efforts because my my conduct with that office isn't very much right now.

Um but that was an idea of the past in terms of uh then that they mentioned already the the sealing of eviction records, which I think is is a really vital piece of of law that I think it's great.

Thank you, Mr.

Ware.

Did that help?

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm appreciative of the the response, but it doesn't help those people who are in a situation where A, they won the victory against them, the landlord, B, they still have their housing choice voucher because they did not legally violate any of the rules, procedures, and protocol uh of HUD, and they're looking to get into a new property, and the old landlord is disparaging them.

The new landlord is will say something verbally via phone, but not put anything down on paper.

So if they are able to properly advocate for themselves, they have no record of what transpired, and now they left out and then they buy it, their voucher expires in 120 days, and now this said person is now homeless.

Well, you heard that uh Suffolk University Law School provides free representation, recommended they and I'm not saying specifically that they come to uh Ashley, but they can certainly come and uh talk to someone at the law school to see about being represented.

So I would recommend they do that.

That's where I would start.

Yeah, that's cool.

Could that information be provided in the housing choice voucher packet when they receive it?

Because within the housing choice voucher packet currently is um the lead inspection.

There's a little three-page pamphlet about discrimination, but not really how to get to the resources or how to document so that they can protect their voucher.

Say that again.

Could could it be provided where in the housing choice voucher packet?

So when they okay.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, thank you, Mr.

Weir.

You're welcome.

All right, you have a great day.

Great.

That's a great suggestion.

Yeah, Ashley?

No, that's that's a great suggestion.

I think so.

We would love for them to have more information when they get their voucher about uh you know what discrimination looks for and what to do if they experience it.

I think that's important because many of the sex and a voucher holders, it's interesting that are discriminated against.

They just don't know what to do.

And uh, you know, we hear if from constituents that come to us, uh, but they just don't know what to do.

Many of them move to Brockton and Taunton, they just don't understand how they can deal with uh what's had just happened, and they don't have much time.

And so the time is ticking, and they're trying to find a place to live, and they're being told no, no, no, no, no.

And so they just they decide they're gonna move to Brockton and Toronto outside of Boston.

So uh the education is really critical.

There's a few more questions.

Uh with regard to uh and I said we talked a little bit about training housing providers.

How much are you gonna do in terms of training the housing providers in 2020?

Depends on the funding that we have.

Everything's funding.

Yeah, and unfortunately, it's all based on you know what grants we have and what those grants are funding.

So we you know, in the past, uh historically we have done trainings for housing providers.

Um we hope to be able to continue to do that if we have funding.

Did the state cut all of your funding?

Um so the state cut all of the funding for the Fair Housing Alliance in Massachusetts, which was funding specifically to address voucher discrimination.

Um they ended, we had been receiving that funding for the past six years and they ended that program.

They did uh we did get a new um new funding through the Fair Housing Trust Fund that the state just recently approved, but unfortunately that funding is for a specific project and doesn't cover our enforcement or testing around voucher discrimination specifically, so thank you.

Just a couple more questions and uh then I think we can wrap up.

Um and Kelly, you talked about the evidence of systemic patterns discrimination in Boston?

Yes.

And in the study, when you think about evidence of systemic and the patterns, and you talked earlier about how discrimination is still present.

How do you how would you recommend that the approach to the uh systemic discovering and identifying evidence of the systemic discrimination?

So when it comes to how testing can help uncover systems or patterns, um, a lot of the time uh testing isn't a one-off.

Like what I would do is I would test the same property over and over, and that's how we were sure that it was a pattern, that it wasn't just you know, someone having a bad day, it wasn't just a fluke, it was their practice, it was their business practice to discriminate against a certain class of people.

So in order to do that repeated testing, of course, funding continues to be the issue, but also I think when it comes to the systemic issue of discrimination, it goes again to how do we deter, especially large properties from discriminating?

I think it has to come down to the enforcement and to have higher penalties for discrimination, and which I believe already exists, higher penalties for repeat discrimination because we've had cases where we've tested a property and maybe we test again years later and they're still doing the same business practice that's discriminatory.

So, you know, it's a matter of making sure that it's not a repeated from the particular housing provider.

And could I just add um that that's why we we want to encourage funding for both testing and enforcement?

Because we really don't want to do one without the other, right?

I mean testing gives us really important information and really important evidence, but we need to then use that testing to do some enforcement right to have some impact on what's happening, or or else we're just you know doing it over and over again and measuring it.

So with regard to enforcement, do you have enforcement funding now or did when the when the state cut that funding?

Was that the enforcement funding that was cut?

So that was, yeah, we the state was who was funding our voucher enforcement specifically.

So we do have some enforcement funding currently from HUD.

We don't know whether, you know, we don't know how long that will continue.

Um in theory, it is a three-year grant, but there's been concerns raised.

Um, and that you know, as we discussed, that doesn't cover any of the protected state protected categories, so we can't do any voucher discrimination enforcement work under that grant.

And and here's my final question for and each of you can answer this or all of what recommendations do you have to the city that you want to make so that we can look at it from the council's perspective as we look at what can we do to really because I think Section 8 discrimination is an area that's so critical, and it's happening right in front of us, and not much is happening.

What would you recommend each of you to the city that we do immediately or as soon as we can uh to help deal with the issue of Section 8 voucher discrimination in Boston?

I think the city needs to continue to be a champion of fair housing and civil rights, just broadly.

I think there have been times, especially prior to the release of the 2020 report where fair housing has been treated as a marginal issue.

Um people don't know what it is, even people within key positions of government, and that's when that happens, that's really unfortunate, and that's when funding falls, that's when you enter these conversations and you're speaking to a room or even just the base layer of kind of information needs to be established before you can get into the nitty-gritty of what's lacking.

And so I think just continuing to have these conversations, continuing to champion civil rights and fair housing is really vital at all levels of government.

And so what would you recommend in terms of championing fair housing?

What would you say the city needs to do that they're not doing?

Uh with respect, I don't think that I can make a recommendation for the city to take specific action.

When you were here, what was critical and helpful in championing uh Section 8 discrimination in the city of Boston when you worked for the fair housing.

I look back on my time partnering with Suffolk with great fondness.

Okay.

I think that that was incredibly impactful in terms of being able to see real results for people in terms of these settlements and probable cause findings that came out of that project.

Okay, okay, thank you.

Yeah, I'd say um to pick up from the findings of testing to do uh to have more funding for enforcement and for um the education piece, both for landlords, real estate brokers, and for tenants.

Um so you know, through the Office of Air Housing, and um I think those have to be really robust components in order to be able to effectively use what we're finding from the testing uh to actually make a difference for people who are struggling to find housing.

Kelly.

Um I would, you know, to not to repeat myself so much, but to be more specific about the funding issue.

I think what we see across the board is that kind of what Andrew's alluding to, sometimes fair housing is put on the back burner as an issue when really it's so broad it affects literally everyone because everyone has the right to a home, right?

Um and I think a lot of our our agencies are we have small staffs.

We have small staffs that sometimes get smaller because we lose funding.

So, you know, to have the ability to hire people who their full-time job is testing or their full-time job is enforcement, or their full-time job is going out into the community and educating folks, that just creates a more robust fair housing culture in Boston, I would say.

Thank you, and Ashley.

Yeah, thank you.

Um I you know, want to echo what everyone has said.

Um, and you know, Andrew in particular mentioning that for the city to be a champion of fair housing and really elevate the conversation.

I was really thrilled to hear that the Office of Fair Housing is gonna have a new director.

I think that that has been a challenge for being able to coordinate some of these partnerships.

You know, all of us up here have been in these incredible partnerships.

Suffolk wouldn't have been able to do our testing report without um the help of the Boston Foundation and and Sony being our our champion and and supporting us through that.

Our partnership when Andrew was at the city of doing that testing and the cases that came out of that.

Um, but I think you know, needing leadership in that office to be able to both, you know, have the funding and then coordinate um uh so that we are doing these innovative, creative partnerships because we're gonna be able to have more of an impact when when we're all working together, and um so I think the funding is important and the coordination uh is important also.

Ashley, you you ended this in a way that I wanted to this is what I wanted to say, because I do want to do some education.

I do think as a counselor, one who practiced a lot of fair housing law when I was at HUD, I do want to get out and do education.

It's it doesn't cost me anything, does are you willing to help me put together some educational events out in the community so that folks can really learn and hear from us about what Section 8 and what voucher discrimination is all about because sometimes you're not gonna get the funding, but you can still do the work and you know you all have been doing the work, and and I say let's all come together like you mentioned uh Ashley, and let's put on some events where we can really give folks information about Section 8 and voucher fair housing discrimination.

And I'd love to work with all of you on some events because I think it's critical right now, and I think it's kind of it is kind of fallen off because the funding keeps decreasing.

But sometimes you can't wait until the funding comes.

Sometimes you've got to really roll up your sleeves.

And I would love to work with you on doing some fair housing education and training if you have time in the field.

And I think it's so needed and we hear it so much, and folks don't understand it.

You know, folks don't understand when they they come to me and say, well, and you know, on my cards, I was recommended.

In fact, Councillor Louis Jin recommended, don't put esquire on your card.

Because everyone's gonna want to come to you.

Even without that, though, I still get a lot of questions when I'm out at different events about folks feeling they were discriminated against, but not knowing what to do.

And it's it's it's kind of sad because there's not much that I can do individually.

We we will try and get out and do some uh education, training where possible, but I would love to do it uh in a coordinated way with uh those of you that are willing to get out there with me and help me uh shout out loud what Section 8 discrimination is all about.

And and you know, the owners, some of them just don't, they don't think what they're doing because they're owners is discrimination because they're not using overt ways or obvious ways.

They they just don't know.

So I'd love to follow up and work with you on trying to get out there and do some events in the field.

Uh I want to thank all of you and my colleague and members of the public who participated in today's hearing.

Uh I really appreciate the testimony, the data, and recommendations.

I got all kind of information now that I'll go back and look at.

Um, because we heard what what I heard today about housing discrimination in Boston and Kelly, thank you for just making it clear that it's still happening.

But the work that's being done to protect residents' fair housing rights.

I want to emphasize today's hearing is not the end of this.

I want to, and and I'm appreciative that um chair of the civil rights uh committee at first, I said, Oh, and I said I do it all the time.

And so when they gave me that, they the chair, I started looking at possibilities.

And uh, and this report has always been in the back of my mind since I left HUD because I really wanted to sue somebody.

I really want to see you know, when this report came out, I said, we got it, we got it.

And and I think it still exists.

And uh six years later, uh we need to make sure that we're not simply acknowledging that discrimination exists, but really identifying what more can the city do.

What can we do to prevent it, detect it, uh, and hold those responsible and accountable, those that are discriminated.

Because for me, civil rights work protection is the way we protect residents who may not know their rights, uh, who may not recognize that they have rights or that the rights have been violated.

Uh, and so it just means continuing to coordinate with the city with MCAD, with Suffolk University Law Schools, uh, and and all the good work that you've been doing, uh, and other partners as well that are really doing the work and are trying to figure out how we can continue to have an impact on fair housing in the city.

And and my goal is really to take what I heard today, I got all kind of notes and continue working with you and my colleagues and the administration.

Uh and I thank you, panelists, for really talking in a way that you know what you're talking about.

I mean, you've got the experience, you've done the work, you know.

I wish Lee Peldon would stay for another year to see if we can't get him to uh and maybe we'll call Orlando to see if if there's some kind of way we can provide some funding for us to do some further work because I think it has to be done.

I think it's something that we can't just say we don't have the funding for.

I think it has, and I think people, I think residents and especially in in my district, uh, depend and rely on us to make sure that in some ways they are protected, or at least they know what discrimination looks like, what it is.

And so uh, you know, residents should not have to overcome uh the discrimination on top of all of the other barriers they they already face.

Uh and and finding a place to live is is so critical to folks that are struggling just to make ends meet.

So again, I thank you for uh uh coming to talk about it, and and now that we've talked about it, uh let's let's do some work about it and see uh how we can help uh folks that are struggling and finding themselves in a predicament where they just don't know what to do.

Thank you so much.

Thank you to our one public uh L Lawrence Wear.

And uh this hearing, docket number one three three nine is now adjourned.

Thank you.