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- ADC forced to challenge another court decision allowing the City to withhold evidence -- this time evidence about its motivations and about alternatives to its policy.
- For all the recent outrage at instance after instance of well-known public figures being found to have engaged in sexual harassment, there has been surprisingly little discussion of any changes to the law that would affect the vast majority of victims of harassment who work in the civilian labor force. Unknown to most people, there is a judge-invented doctrine that throws must victims out of court. That doctrine says that harassment is not actionable unless it is “severe or pervasive.” But any state or municipality friendly to civil rights can throw that doctrine in the trash bin where it belongs.
- Ask court to consider fully the information and perspective offered by ADC and to order remedies proposed by ADC.
- New York City has disproportionate burden because its neighbors shirk their responsibilities.
- Preferences given in affordable housing lotteries help perpetuate City's intense levels of residential segregation.
- Supplemental report focuses on failure to take required actions in respect to one development. Monitor still not seeking action on broader issues.
- Latest status report does begin to cite subset of County's violations, but remains wedded to the false narrative that "progress" continues to occur and adds additional "cheating units." Window-dressing changes to zoning that leave vast single-family areas highly segregated and untouched by affordable housing are lauded. Westchester's six years of across-the-board refusal to challenge municipalities who retain barriers to fair housing choice not discussed.
- Decision puts into sharp relief the U.S. Attorney’s unwillingness to demand full accountability.
- Governor Cuomo and Representative Lowey once again fail the test of providing civil rights leadership. Why don't they call for Westchester to be punished for its failure to comply with its court-ordered housing desegregation obligations?
- Faulty premises about nature of problem yield faulty solutions. An effective rule can't assume cooperative jurisdictions. A requirement for practical actions steps still nowhere to be found.
- Failure to analyze different minority groups separately and focus on "clustering" instead of "segregation" among the problems identified. Monitor refuses to believe that HUD letter actually represents genuine or considered view of agency or U.S. Attorney; demands further "signal" from Government.
- A legal analysis true to established law would really rock the boat, so the Monitor made up his own, more limited, rule.
- Privilege? Check. Secrecy? Check. Unaccountability? Check. Breeding grounds for discrimination? You bet. Do you have a co-op horror story to tell?
- More civil rights groups have concluded that enforcement of the landmark housing desegregation court order entered against Westchester County five years ago has been entirely inadequate and are demanding that the Justice Department "alter course and vindicate the integrity of the consent decree."
- At court conference on Westchester case, U.S. attorney tries to excuse its failure to hold Westchester to account by suggesting that a defendant can shield itself from having to perform court-ordered tasks by denying the existence of facts staring the defendant in the face.
- Civil rights advocates and other activists are among many who do. So what's our problem? To start, the phrase often acts to sanitize segregation. Plus the phrase is often used to suggest -- consciously or unconsciously -- that you can use race or ethnicity as a proxy to be able to judge the opinions, interests, or behavior of all members of a group or neighborhood. And that's just the beginning.
