Tag Archives: Vermont Human Rights Commission

Vermont Civil Rights Conference this November

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The Vermont Human Rights Commission is hosting the inaugural Vermont Civil Rights Conference on November 17-19, 2020. This year’s conference is focused on the theme of Fair Housing: The Consequences of Housing Segregation and Where we go From Here.

This three-day conference is free and open to the public, and features Richard Rothstein, author of The Color of Law, and Sarika Tandon, Equity Strategist and Racial Justice advocate.

Richard Rothstein is an American academic and author affiliated with the Economic Policy Institute, and a senior fellow, emeritus at the Thurgood Marshall Institute of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. His current research focuses on the history of segregation in the United States with regards to education and housing, and he is most recently recognized for authoring The Color of Law. We’ve called on the expertise of Richard Rothstein many times in our Thriving Communities blog, most recently highlighting his Op-Ed in the New York Times here.

Sarika Tandon is an equity strategist and racial justice advocate.  She consults, teaches, writes, researches, and collaborates at the intersection of race, equity, and environmental issues. Sarika is deeply committed to working within the environmental movement to address issues of racial and environmental injustice and to support the inherent power, brilliance, and well-being of communities of color. She also  supports racial equity in nonprofit, education, criminal justice reform, and cultural spheres.

Other workshops include, “Housing Barriers in Vermont: Community Challenges & Collective Solutions – Moving the work forward collectively,”  “Vermont’s Housing Crisis: State’s Consolidated Plan – What are we doing about it?” “Fair Housing Act: Critiques and Implications” and “Community Reflections on the Consequences of Housing Segregation and Where we go from Here.” Panelists include representatives from various housing and support organizations, state government, and fair housing advocates – including the CVOEO Fair Housing Project.

All community members are welcome to join. Please see below for additional information about the conference.

Register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYtdOyqqzoqHtF6v3iTob9QIcRSvRLnuAux

After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

The Vermont Human Rights Commission works to promote full civil and human rights in Vermont by enforcing laws and providing education  around equal access to housing, places of public accommodation, and in state government employment. The Commission protects people from unlawful discrimination in housing, state government employment, and public accommodations. Learn more about the VHRC’s at https://hrc.vermont.gov/.

Housing bias in Vermont: more than meets the eye

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Amid all the overarching attention to housing segregation and inclusiveness prompted by HUD’s newly released AFFH rule, we shouldn’t lose sight of housing discrimination at the granular, or individual level. It’s still very much with us, in Vermont and everywhere else. What’s more, there’s a good deal of housing discrimination that goes unreported, as a cursory look at Vermont’s statistics makes clear.

First, the national picture: HUD does an annual report toting up housing discrimination complaints based on seven protected categories in the Fair Housing Act: race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability, familial status. In the last fiscal year for which data are available, total complaints to HUD and affiliated agencies totaled 8,368, of which 53 percent were based on disability, 28 percent on race, 14 percent on familial status (presence of minor children) and 12 percent on national origin.

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Now consider the complaints filed with the Vermont Human Rights Commission. According to the commission’s most recent annual report, there were 41 housing discrimination complaints in Fiscal Year 2014, of which 19 were based on disability, 4 on  race/color, 4 on “minor children,” and 1 on national origin.

The numbers in Vermont are pretty low, and the discriminatory profile is a bit different from the that for the nation as a whole. Disability is the major source of complaints here, as elsewhere, but in Vermont just 10 percent of the complaints pertained to race. Granted, Vermont is 95 percent white, but the number seems low for two reasons.

For one thing, hundreds of refugees are arriving in Vermont every year. It seems implausible that they confront no discrimination based in the real-estate rental market based on race, religion or national origin.

For another thing, Vermont Legal Aid’s periodic tests of Vermont’s rental markets show much higher incidences of discrimination than are reflected in the complaint statistics.

In 2012-13, VLA conducted more than 200 tests, using control testers and subject testers of assorted races and national origins expressing interest in renting apartments. “Forty-four percent of the tests conducted either demonstrated overt discrimination against the subject tester or otherwise showed preferential treatment toward the control tester,” the VLA’s report concluded. “(T)here were significant rates of disparate treatment against the subject testers in 46 percent of the national origin tests, 45 percent of the familial status test, 36 percent of the African American race/color tests, and 22 percent of the disability tests.”

So, why aren’t more fair housing complaints filed in Vermont? Perhaps because many tenants don’t know their rights, or because they might fear retaliation. As it happens, protection from retaliation is one the rights they might not be aware of.