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Housing Diversity Committee Newsletter: March 2022


Fostering unity, equity, diversity and inclusion in the real estate industry.


Upcoming Events & Resources

Temecula Valley Hospital and Southwest Healthcare System are pleased to invite the community to our Women’s Health Expo.

About this event

Fri, March 25, 2022
10:00 AM – 1:30 PM PDT

Discover the wide range of women’s healthcare programs and services provided by Temecula Valley Hospital, Inland Valley Medical Center and Rancho Springs Medical Center.

At the Expo, you can:

  • Learn about hospital services like cardiology, stroke care and gynecology
  • Learn from physician speakers about symptoms, risk factors and lifestyle changes
  • Get health screenings
  • Enjoy a delicious lunch
  • Meet our community partners … and more!

Register For This Event

AREAA Global Luxury Summit
2022 AREAA, Denver, CO
March 28-30, 2022
Four Seasons Hotel
Register here: https://cvent.me/5axb2q

2022 Women’s Health Expo
Mar 25th, 10:00am
Pechanga Resorr and Casino
Summit Ballroom
Temecula
Registration Link:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2022-womens-health-expo-registration-242960891567?aff=ebdssbdestsearch

International Women’s Day Celebration Circle
Carlsbad, CA
March 9th, 6:00pm
Registration Link:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/international-womens-day-celebration-circle-tickets-277274985947?aff=ebdssbdestsearch

Free Women’s Only BJJ Self Defense 
March 27, 11:00am
EDJ Martial Arts Hemet
Registration Link:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/free-womens-only-bjj-self-defense-special-tickets-273993972347?aff=ebdssbdestsearch

Housing Diversity Committee Meeting

Open to SRCAR® Members

We invite you to join us the 2nd Thursday of every month at 9:00am via zoom to share ideas and collaborate in bringing forth our mission.

Mission:
To foster unity, equity, diversity and inclusion in the real estate industry.

Meetings are currently online via Zoom

Deliberately Fair Housing

Check out the Deliberately Fair Housing Facebook group. Fair Housing & Equality for All! Please note this group is not monitored by SRCAR®

Click Here to Join

Complete the Fairhaven Training
Show your commitment to fair housing by accessing Fairhaven, NAR’s innovative training platform that uses the power of storytelling to help REALTORS® identify, prevent, and address discriminatory practices in real estate.

Click Here to Start


Housing Diversity Committee Newsletter: February 2022


Fostering unity, equity, diversity and inclusion in the real estate industry.


An annual celebration of African Americans’ powerful legacy, Black History Month has been honored in California—and nationwide—every February for nearly 100 years, beginning with Carter G. Woodson’s establishment of Negro History Week in 1926. This year, though you’ll find a few parades and festivals remain on pause, there are still plenty of ways to recognize Black excellence in the Golden State and reflect on the continued struggle for racial justice across the country. Click Here to read full article


Upcoming Events & Resources

Housing Diversity Committee Meeting

Open to SRCAR® Members

We invite you to join us the 2nd Thursday of every month at 10:00am at SRCAR Murrieta & Zoom to share ideas and collaborate in bringing forth our mission.

Mission:
To foster unity, equity, diversity and inclusion in the real estate industry.

Deliberately Fair Housing

Check out the Deliberately Fair Housing Facebook group. Fair Housing & Equality for All! Please note this group is not monitored by SRCAR®

Click Here to Join

Complete the Fairhaven Training
Show your commitment to fair housing by accessing Fairhaven, NAR’s innovative training platform that uses the power of storytelling to help REALTORS® identify, prevent, and address discriminatory practices in real estate.

Click Here to Start


The COVID-19 Eviction Moratorium Saga


BY: JOHN V. GIARDINELLI, ATTORNEY AT LAW | OF COUNSEL

In March of 2020, Congress passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act) in an attempt to alleviate the many problems unleashed by the rapidly spreading COVID–19 pandemic.1 Among other basic financial programs, the Act provided for a 120-day eviction moratorium for all properties in the U.S. that were involved in federal assistance programs or that were taking advantage of federally backed loans.1 This limited moratorium on evictions ended in July, 2020, and Congress did not renew it or pass any other bill authorizing the approval of such action.

Despite Congress not prioritizing the action legislatively as dictated by the Constitution, the CDC, an Executive Branch
agency, decided to act unilaterally in imposing a new moratorium.1 This moratorium was even more sweeping than
the one passed by the CARES Act and blanketed over every single residential property nationwide.1 It also imposed criminal sanctions on anyone who violated the terms of the moratorium. The CDC’s moratorium was set to extend from July 2020 until December 31, 2020. However, Congress, through another relief bill, extended the CDC moratorium as written for another month.1 When this deadline approached, the CDC once again unilaterally extended its own deadline multiple times all the way until July of 2021.1

The CDC, an agency tasked to deal with disease control, claimed that it had authority to engage in this unilateral action based on §361(a) of the Public Health Service Act for authority to promulgate and extend the eviction moratorium. However, this section of the PHSA only states:

“The Surgeon General, with the approval of the [Secretary of Health and Human Services], is authorized to make and enforce such regulations as in his judgment are necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of
communicable diseases from foreign countries into the States or possessions, or from one State or possession
into any other State or possession. For purposes of carrying out and enforcing such regulations, the Surgeon General may provide for such inspection, fumigation, disinfection, sanitation, pest extermination, destruction of animals or articles found to be so infected or contaminated as to be sources of dangerous infection to human beings, and other measures, as in his judgment may be necessary.”

Please note that there is no actual mention of anything involving landlords, tenants, mortgages, or rent. In fact, the 1944 Statute was only ever used to quarantine infected individuals and prohibit the import or sale of animals known to transmit disease.1

Needless to say, landlords, REALTORS®, rental property managers, and anyone who made their living through these
means saw this as an extensive overreach of a rouge government agency and legal challenges were brought all over the nation against the CDC moratorium.

In the Moratorium’s first trip to the United States Supreme Court, the emergency application to vacate stay was denied.
While this, on its face, was a victory for the Moratorium, it was clear to many that the CDC action would not last much longer. Justice Kavanaugh, in his opinion, wrote:

“I agree with the District Court and the applicants that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention exceeded its existing statutory authority by issuing a nationwide eviction moratorium. Because the CDC plans to end the moratorium in only a few weeks, on July 31, and because those few weeks will allow for additional and more orderly distribution of the congressionally appropriated rental assistance funds, I vote at this time to deny the application to vacate the District Court’s stay of its order.”1

In a rather utilitarian manor, and to the horror of many strict Constitutionalists, Justice Kavanaugh justified keeping the order in place for the remining few weeks to give the Government time to set up rental assistance.1
While it survived for a few additional weeks, the writing was on the wall for the Moratorium.


As the Moratorium once again expired on July 31st, the CDC defiantly extended it despite Kavanaugh’s concurrence that clearly signaled its doom in court. Once again, the issue came up before the Supreme Court. However, this time there would be no victory for the Moratorium. In a Per Curiam opinion, the Court wrote:

“Indeed, the Government’s read of §361(a) would give the CDC a breathtaking amount of authority. It is hard to see what measures this interpretation would place outside the CDC’s reach, and the Government has identified no limit in §361(a) beyond the requirement that the CDC deem a measure “necessary.” Could the CDC, for example, mandate free grocery delivery to the homes of the sick or vulnerable? Require manufacturers to provide free computers to enable people to work from home? Order telecommunications companies to provide free high-speed Internet service to facilitate remote work? This claim of expansive authority under §361(a) is unprecedented. Since that provision’s enactment in 1944, no regulation premised on it has even begun to approach the size or scope of the eviction moratorium. And it is further amplified by the CDC’s decision to impose criminal penalties of up to a $250,000 fine and one year in jail on those who violate the moratorium. Section 361(a) is a wafer-thin reed on which to rest such sweeping power.”1

In an opinion that any lay person could have reasoned, the CDC Eviction Moratorium came to an end as the Justices concluded that Congress must specifically authorize any federally imposed eviction moratorium since the CDC had no power to unilaterally do so.1

Commentators were quick to declare the Supreme Court’s ruling as a harbinger for mass evictions and a huge homelessness crisis in the county.1 However, a few months have passed and no such crisis has occurred.1 Many theorize that this lack of a crisis is due to states like California passing their own moratoriums and rental aid1 , or the federal aid Kavanaugh discussed in his first utilitarian opinion. However, with state moratoriums set to expire soon, experts are still worried that a homelessness crisis is looming on the horizon for millions of Americans. Despite many
wishes that the CDC moratorium remain in place, the legal reality of its unconstitutionality was abundantly clear.

How will this situation resolve? Will cities and states continue to shield tenants? Will Congress step in once again?

Only time will tell.

C.A.R. & NAR Business Update Forms Update


At the MLS Marketing and Preview meeting on November 30, 2021, Curtis Doss gave a presentation on the upcoming changes and some new forms that are hitting the transactions suite soon. If you’d like to review these changes, please download the following 4 files. And as always, if you have any questions let us know at [email protected].

No License to Discriminate: 5 Discrimination Laws for REALTORS®


BY: JOHN V. GIARDINELLI, ATTORNEY AT LAW | OF COUNSEL

Avoiding Discrimination in Real Estate
Housing is a necessity for life. It is no wonder that the Government protects individuals from discrimination that would keep them from obtaining this necessity. However, sometimes the interactions of these laws can create a challenging landscape to navigate for brokers, REALTORS®, and other real estate professionals. In many cases, a failure to understand the intricacy of such law can lead to accidental discrimination that was not in the mind of the REALTOR® or broker at the time of listing. A good knowledge of each applicable law will keep REALTORS® out of trouble.

The Laws

  1. Civil Rights Act of 1866
    The Civil Rights Act of 1866 prohibits all racial discrimination in the sale or rental of property on a very basic level.
  2. Fair Housing Act
    The Fair Housing Act enforces a national policy of fair housing throughout the United States for “protected classes.” The FHA makes it illegal to discriminate in the sale, lease, or rental of housing, or making housing otherwise unavailable, because of race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, or national origin.
  3. Americans with Disabilities Act
    The Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits discrimination against disabilities in public accommodations and commercial facilities.
  4. Equal Credit Opportunity Act
    The Equal Credit Opportunity Act makes discrimination unlawful to make any credit application contingent upon any factor that involves the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, age. It is also illegal to make the application contingent if all or part of the applicant’s income derives from any welfare or public assistance program.
  5. State and Local Laws
    State and local laws often provide even broader coverage than federal law. For example, in California, The Unruh civil rights act extends further protection from discrimination by all business establishments in California, including housing and public accommodations.

What to look for: Responsibilities & Disparate Impact
While each of these laws contains separate provisions for different classes of people, there are general actions that real estate professionals can take to avoid running afoul of any of them.

Real estate professionals and landlords have a responsibility under the combination of all these laws to not discriminate in the sale, rental, and financing of any property based on race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, or national origin. On a basic level, this means that no limitations in the sale or rental can be made before or during the sale that would make it contingent on any of these protected factors of the person looking to buy or rent. This would include denying that housing is available and advertising only to certain classes of people that there is a sale or vacancy. These types of actions and conditions would amount to blatantly discriminatory terms and subject the real estate professional at hand to serious liability.

While following the basic principles of not blatantly discriminating is relatively easy as stated above, there is an area included in the FHA that makes things a bit trickier. In Texas Dept. of Housing and Community Affairs v. Inclusive Communities Project, Inc., the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that disparate impact claims are cognizable under the FHA. This means that policies or practices that are even neutral on their face could still violate the FHA because they might have a “discriminatory effect.”

Some of these less obvious forms of discrimination in the real estate arena are as follows:

  • Requiring applicants to have full-time employment. While this seems like a good business decision, court might find that this discriminates against various protected classes including those with disabilities and even veterans. The easiest way to avoid this blunder is to ask for “proof of income” instead, as it includes benefits and not job status.
  • Asking for criminal history is another sticky wicket that could result in disparate impact. The key mistake in this situation is asking for criminal history without allowing for proper clarification from the potential renter or buyer.

In short, the best way to avoid disparate impact claims is to think thoroughly through every requirement you make as a condition of renting or selling a property. Do an analysis of every type of person that may be arguably impacted by it and check to see if they are a protected class. If you find that it does, you may still try to tailor the requirement so that it does not affect the specific class in the same harsh way.