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Santa Cruz tenants who alleged disability bias get $100,000

Santa Cruz Sentinel - 8/19/2018

Aug. 19--LIVE OAK -- The owner and manager of Seaside Apartments has agreed to pay $100,000 to settle a lawsuit with two tenants who alleged their landlord and property manager discriminated against them because of their disabilities.

The settlement in favor of Alicia Lopez and her mother, Zaida Ramos, was announced July 30 by the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing.

The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits housing providers from denying or limiting housing to persons with disabilities, or from refusing to make reasonable accommodations in policies or practices for persons with disabilities.

Seaside Apartments, an 84-unit garden-style complex built in 1981 at 1390 30th Ave., has a Section 8 contract with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. That means some rents are based on tenant incomes, with tenants paying 30 percent of their income toward rent and the federal agency paying the remainder.

Lopez told the Sentinel that renters are scared to report problems and that she appreciated the legal help she got.

The California Department of Fair Employment and Housing, which filed the lawsuit in 2017, named Seaside Apartment Associates, DKD Property Management of San Jose, which manages Seaside Apartments, and property manager Rebekah Scott as defendants.

DKD agreed to pay $5,000 in attorney's fees to the state agency to ensure on-site property managers attend a two-hour training with a fair-housing organization and post fair-housing posters in Spanish and English.

Messages left by the Sentinel for DKD staff this week were not returned.

Seaside Apartment Associates was represented by San Jose attorney Jeffrey Widman, who through a spokeswoman declined to comment.

Seaside Apartments Associates is a partnership of Laurie Onderdonk Knox, president of Argonaut Capital Corp. in Menlo Park, John "Joe" Brezzo, manager of Brezzo Master LLC in San Jose, and Charles W. Davidson, manager of Davidson Master LLC in San Jose.

LEASE VIOLATION?

Lopez has lived at Seaside Apartments since 1998. In 2003, when her niece was living with her, her mother moved in, according to lawsuit.

Both Lopez and her mother have disabilities requiring in-home supportive services.

Alberto Lopez Ramos, Lopez' brother, had provided those services since 2005, the year Lopez requested a reasonable accommodation from the property manager.

In August 2016, the two tenants got a notice of termination, purportedly for violating the lease by having Alberto live with them, based on observations of male clothing and additional toiletries in the apartment, according to the lawsuit.

The next day, Alberto applied to become an official occupant of the apartment and Lopez and her mother sought to recertify their Section 8 tenancy with Alberto as an added tenant.

In September 2016, Lopez and her mother got a 60-day termination notice.

They met with management to explain that Alberto was their live-in aide and provided verification of their disabilities, but the request for reasonable accommodation was denied, according to the lawsuit.

In November, management approved the request for a live-in aide but "disqualified" Lopez' brother "without basis," the lawsuit said.

Lopez and her mother said they could not find a service to provide care overnight to low-income people with disabilities.

EVICTION LAWSUITS

When their request for accommodation was denied, they filed a complaint on Dec. 14, 2016, with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which referred the complaint to the state Department of Fair Employment and Housing.

The landlord and property management company responded by filing an "unlawful detainer" action against Lopez and her mother, seeking to evict them.

Santa Cruz County averaged 483 eviction lawsuits annually from 2014 to 2016, adding up to 1,450 for that three-year stretch and 499,000 statewide, according to a report in May by advocacy group Tenants Together and based on data from the state Judicial Council.

The data show 40 percent of eviction lawsuits statewide end in a judgment against the tenant, usually due to failure to respond within five calendar day as required or faulty paperwork.

Of the 482 eviction cases filed in 2016 in Santa Cruz County, 154 ended in a judgment against the tenant, with 150 due to a lack of response or paperwork errors.

California law does not require notices to terminate tenancy to be filed with any agency, and Tenants Together contends that should be changed to generate data to inform state policy.

JUDGE RULES

In March 2017, Santa Cruz Superior Court Judge John Gallagher dismissed the eviction action and ruled the landlord's refusal to allow the presence of an aide was discriminatory.

Melanie Proctor, senior staff counsel at state Department of Fair Employment and Housing, represented the agency, which brought the case to a conclusion with the $100,000 settlement.

Melia Powell, an attorney with Senior Citizens Legal Services in Santa Cruz, said she sees a lot of cases where tenants allege disability but "not so many" where such a result is obtained.

Last month, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced agreements with three housing providers in California and Idaho, settling claims and they discriminated against individuals with disabilities. The amounts ranged from $6,000 to $10,000.

This year, the state Department of Fair Employment and Housing has settled more than a dozen cases alleging housing discrimination; cases have involved emotional support animals, close-in parking and a broken elevator.

Often landlords are not familiar with the law, according to Cynthia Berger, who created the Santa Cruz Tenants Association and a complaint hotline in 2014.

"I have written many letters for tenants to their landlord about what reasonable accommodation is," said Berger, who is one of the four authors of the rent control and just cause eviction ordinance on the city of Santa Cruz ballot Nov. 6. "They are usually are very happy to comply once they understand that."

Persons who believe they have experienced discrimination may file a complaint by calling HUD's Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity, 800-669-9777, or filing online at hud.gov/fairhousing.

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