OUR MISSION

To protect and expand fair housing rights, eliminate housing discrimination, and promote integrated communities.

A YEAR IN REVIEW

Throughout 2021, our communities experienced many ups and downs. Nearly a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, the availability of vaccines brought relief to some and allowed a slow return to normalcy. The news of expanded protections for LGBTQ+ Americans and the revival of two important fair housing rules at the federal level encouraged fair housing advocates near and far. Still, for many others, the pandemic’s impact on health, jobs, and housing continued to weigh heavily. The lingering effects of the pandemic, as well as the end of the CDC Eviction Moratorium in late 2021, left many families struggling to pay rent and at risk of losing their housing. Through all of the ups and downs of the year, the Fair Housing Center for Rights & Research continued to offer fair housing assistance and support to those who needed it most.

The Fair Housing Center’s Research team published Exclusionary Zoning in Cuyahoga County, Part II. As was done in part one of the report, part two continues to explore how zoning perpetuates racial segregation in Cuyahoga County, this time focusing on school districts and group homes. Our Research team also completed an Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice for the City of Parma. The Fair Housing Center assisted in identifying impediments to housing choice in the city by performing data analysis, qualitative analysis, and a review of Parma’s municipal ordinances. Additionally, we published our annual State of Fair Housing in Northeast Ohio report – the Fair Housing Center’s 15th annual comprehensive survey of fair housing for Ashtabula, Cuyahoga, Geauga, Lake, Lorain, and Medina Counties. The report found that, 53 years after the passage of the Fair Housing Act, housing discrimination remains wide spread.

Our Advocacy team worked with hundreds of residents around Northeast Ohio to protect and advocate on behalf of their fair housing rights. We continued to expand our advocacy efforts around Pay to Stay protections for renters and enforcement of Source of Income (SOI) ordinances in the jurisdictions where they exist, in addition to pushing for County-wide SOI protections. We provided 1,400 community referrals to families facing housing insecurity to ensure that they were able to access rental assistance, learn how to report and remedy code violations in their homes, and get in contact with legal services in the event of an eviction. Advocates conducted intakes for new complaints of housing discrimination, which rose 68% from 2020. Systemic discrimination actions, paired with an affordable housing crisis amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic, have led to a growing call volume. The Fair Housing Center handled 17 new agency cases in 2021 and continued work on another 24 ongoing agency cases. The Fair Housing Center filed 19 new charges of housing discrimination with administrative agencies for investigation, directly resolved one agency complaint in-house and settled 10 cases. In addition to work on our own agency cases, our fair housing advocates assisted dozens of clients in preparing and filing their own fair housing complaints with appropriate enforcement agencies.

Our Education & Outreach team continued to connect with folks in the community, in an effort to increase awareness of fair housing rights and our services. In 2021, The Fair Housing Center conducted 35 fair housing trainings to a total of 1,272 people. A total of 63.5 hours of training were conducted, with 2,069 total training hours completed over the course of the year. We continued to develop educational content and materials, including five new fact sheets and two online courses. Additionally, our team distributed approximately 9,000 fair housing materials throughout the region in 2021 alone, in an effort to educate community members on their fair housing rights.

We believe in this community, we believe that housing is a human right, and we believe in the power of fair housing advocacy. No matter what life throws your way, the Fair Housing Center for Rights & Research will be here as a resource, working to protect your right to fair and equitable housing opportunities, just as we have done for the past four decades. With your support, we can continue working to protect and expand fair housing rights, eliminate housing discrimination, and promote integrated communities in Northeast Ohio.

RESEARCH & REPORTS

In 2021, The Fair Housing Center’s Research team conducted research and published two reports surrounding fair housing policy. The data in these reports provides readers with a clearer picture of existing barriers to fair housing, while our team's recommendations offer a path forward to a more fair and equitable future. Our Research team also completed an Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice for the City of Parma. The Fair Housing Center assisted in identifying impediments to housing choice in the city by performing data analysis, qualitative analysis, and a review of Parma’s municipal ordinances.

In April, we published our annual State of Fair Housing in Northeast Ohio report. This was The Fair Housing Center’s 15th annual comprehensive survey of fair housing for Ashtabula, Cuyahoga, Geauga, Lake, Lorain, and Medina Counties. The report found that, 53 years after the passage of the Fair Housing Act, housing discrimination remains wide spread. In 2020, there were 97 complaints of housing discrimination in Northeast Ohio filed with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The Fair Housing Center estimates that there are at least 33,690 instances of housing discrimination annually in the region, showing that the complaints filed represent only a small fraction of the total number of instances of housing discrimination in the region. Housing segregation has remained constant for African Americans since 1990, and the region is ranked 5th most segregated for major metropolitan areas. The report includes a review of municipal fair housing laws and local zoning codes. In Northeast Ohio, 61 municipalities have local fair housing ordinances, many of which expand protection beyond national and state laws. Fifty municipalities have zoning ordinances that restrict or regulate group homes in ways that potentially violate the Fair Housing Act. Thirty-six municipalities have criminal activity nuisance ordinances that that have been shown to disproportionately target and often cause the eviction of people of color, victims of domestic violence, and people with disabilities.

In May, our agency published Exclusionary Zoning in Cuyahoga County, Part II: School Districts and Group Homes. As was done in part one of the report, part two continues to explore how zoning perpetuates racial segregation in Cuyahoga County, this time focusing on school districts and group homes. The report analyzes the municipal zoning codes for every school district in Cuyahoga County and shows that exclusive, single-family residential use districts dominate the geography of Cuyahoga County. These districts are predominantly white enclaves that maintain the privilege of homeownership and access to quality public education for the white middle and upper classes by using zoning as a tool for exclusion. Municipalities regulate the property tax base as well as household access to school districts by controlling what types of homes can exist in a district. Of Cuyahoga County's thirty-two public school districts, the municipalities of two school districts nearly entirely exclude multifamily housing, and the municipalities of most outer-ring school districts in the County zoned less than 5% of land for multifamily housing. Additionally, fourteen municipalities in Cuyahoga County use their zoning codes to limit residential choice for people with disabilities by restricting group home density by setting minimum distance requirements between group homes or excluding group homes from certain residential districts. The Fair Housing Center recommends that municipalities voluntarily eliminate zoning regulations that ban multifamily housing and that municipalities with group home density restrictions repeal them.

ADVOCACY & ENFORCEMENT

Our Advocacy team worked with hundreds of residents around Northeast Ohio to protect and advocate on behalf of their fair housing rights. We continued to expand our advocacy efforts around Pay to Stay protections for renters and enforcement of Source of Income (SOI) ordinances in the jurisdictions where they exist, in addition to pushing for County-wide SOI protections. We provided 1,400 community referrals to families facing housing insecurity to ensure that they were able to access rental assistance, learn how to report and remedy code violations in their homes, and get in contact with legal services in the event of an eviction.

Advocates in the Enforcement Department conducted intakes for 394 new complaints of housing discrimination, up 68% from 2020. An increasing number of folks who called in for assistance identified as issues of systemic discrimination actions such as serial housing denials, denials for prior evictions, source of income discrimination, and inferior unit maintenance. These factors, paired with an affordable housing crisis amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic, have led to a growing call volume.

Our staff responded by educating housing providers on the discriminatory effects of tenant screening policies like blanket criminal history bans and the automatic denial of applicants who have income from Social Security Disability Insurance. We have also spent this past year helping clients with disabilities exercise their right to request exceptions to housing provider policies that prevent them from equally using and enjoying their homes. Though many community members think of disabilities as primarily physical conditions, 48% of disability-related allegations in 2021 related to a person with a mental disability.

The Fair Housing Center handled 17 new agency cases in 2021 and continued work on another 24 ongoing agency cases. The Fair Housing Center filed 19 new charges of housing discrimination with administrative agencies for investigation, directly resolved one agency complaint in-house and settled 10 cases. In addition to work on our own agency cases, our fair housing advocates assisted dozens of clients in preparing and filing their own fair housing complaints with appropriate enforcement agencies.

Note: The total number of alleged bases of discrimination (504) is greater than the total number of new client complaints reported to our office (394) because some complaints allege discrimination on more than one basis.

EDUCATION & OUTREACH

In 2021, our Education & Outreach team continued to connect with folks in the community, in an effort to increase awareness of fair housing rights and our services. We continued to develop educational content and materials, including five new fact sheets and two online courses. Below, learn more about the fair housing trainings our Education & Outreach team conducted in 2021:

Approximately 9,000 fair housing materials were distributed throughout the region in 2021.

FINANCIAL STATEMENT

2021 Expenses

• Programs: $703,037
• Management & General: $19,651
• Development: $32,753
• Total Expenses: $755,441

2021 Revenues

• Program Income: $138,811
• Grant Income: $438,337
• PPP Loan Forgiveness: $88,776
• Contribution Income: $30,227
• Interest Income: $234
• Total Revenues: $696,385