Agenda - 04-15-2008-3d - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

. Orange County, North Carolina - AIFCH - 2007 4) Failure to .print "Equal Housing Opportunity" logo or language. B. Explicit discriminatory statements The Consultants found no advertising that expressed an explicit discriminatory preference. The classified advertising staff at the newspaper appears to be doing a competent job of screening out explicitly discriminatory advertising. C. Subtly discouraging language The consultants looked for subtly discouraging language throughout the classified advertising. Thirty to forty percent of the rental advertisements contained the phrase "no pets". While "pets" per se are not covered by the Fair Housing Act, people with disabilities.who need animals for support or assistance are likely not to contact housing providers who run such advertisements, even though the Fair Housing Act would allow those individuals in most cases to request a reasonable accommodation allowing them to have an animal despite a "no-pets" policy. Not all people with disabilities are aware of their rights to such an accommodation, and other people would prefer not to go through the difficulty of requesting one. Specifically, one advertisement stated:"Absolutely no pets". Clearly, this restriction would rule out the presence of a service animal or an emotional support animal. Also, each day at least a few advertisements made reference to a "quiet neighborhood" or a "great neighborhood". The phrase "quiet neighborhood" may be off-putting to families with children, who might prefer a neighborhood that appears to be more welcoming. Best fair housing practice dictates that descriptions of neighborhoods in general be avoided in favor of descriptions of the amenities of the unit being offered. In addition, one of the web-based providers provided a link to "neighborhood information". Among the search criteria and links were `single with children' and `married with children'. These criteria may 'tend to segregate families with children.' Therefore, this link would not be recommended. Finally, several advertisements alluded to the school system which served the area. Specifically, many ads cited the `County' schools as serving the community. On its face, this may merely communicate educational service information. However, if the City/County schools are predominately African-American and the County/City schools are heavily populated by Caucasians, such an ad may be construed as a `code' for expressing a preference on the basis of race. D. Use of Human Models One clear concern in the review of print advertisements was the preponderance of the white sales force. In feature advertisements used by real estate professionals, it was extremely rare to view anon-white sales person. Regardless of the reasons, real estate companies and lenders might have for publishing pictures of their (mostly) white sales forces, such overwhelming one- sidedness could be subtly discouraging to non-white home seekers. 31