The Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988: The Second Generation of Fair Housing

A generation has passed since the legislative victories of the 1960s extending civil rights protection: twenty-five years since the passage of the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964,1 twenty-four years since the passage of the Voting Rights Act, and twenty-one years since the passage of the Fair Housing Act of 1968. As we enter the second generation of civil rights enforcement under new Presidential leadership it is important to assess the state of civil rights, to examine the experience of first generation enforcement and the promises of the second generation. The state of civil rights in the area of housing is a mixture of both frustration and hope. Unlike the extraordinary advances in integrating public accommodations, the workplace, and the political system, the Nation\u27s housing has been largely ignored. Although an increasing number of blacks are present in America\u27s suburbs and predominantly white neighborhoods, the stark pattern of racial residential segregation has worsened. America is more segregated--physically separated by race--today than at any time in its history

An Unfinished Agenda: The Federal Fair Housing Enforcement Effort

Federal fair housing enforcement effort, like such terms as military justice and honest lawyer, is an oxymoron. There are isolated examples of federal fair housing enforcement efforts, but the federal government\u27s historically dominant role in segregating the nation, resisting the dismantlement of apartheid, and ignoring pervasive patterns of housing discrimination eclipses these largely symbolic efforts.\u27 Critiques of the federal fair housing enforcement effort invariably focus on the incredibly low numbers of cases and complaints handled by the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department and by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). From the 1968 passage of Title VIII until 1980, the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department brought approximately 300 cases; by 1979 it was handling about 32 cases per year. However, in the early years of the Reagan Administration, the Justice Department filed no cases, and in 1987 the Department filed only 17 Title VIII cases. The other arm of federal enforcement, the HUD conciliation mechanism created by section 810 of Title VIII, has a similarly disappointing record. In 1977, for example, HUD received about 3,391 complaints, only 277 of which HUD successfully conciliated. The Justice Department, prior to the Reagan Administration, settled only 23 complaints each year. The victims of discrimination obtained the contested housing in only about one fourth of these contested cases. The most disturbing aspect of the current nearly invisible federal enforcement effort is the total absence of leadership in the quest for equal rights

Litigation Strategies and Judicial Review Under Title I of the Housing and Community Development Act of 1974

This Article will explore the strengths and weaknesses of these program requirements, and will attempt to forecast the litigable issues that might be raised, and in doing so assess the potential for judicial intervention

Social Sustainability: Planning for Growth in Distressed Places—The German Experience in Berlin, Wittenberg, and the Ruhr

Although German plans for growth, both in the Ruhr Valley and in Berlin, have included traditional environmental and physical planning elements, they have also embraced social sustainability and the inclusion of nontraditional planning elements in their strategies for community development. These planning elements are designed to enhance the regional self image and the image that is portrayed to visitors and to instill optimism for the community’s future economic growth. Social sustainability planning involves aggressive and symbolic investments indirectly designed to enhance a community’s investment attractiveness