Opening Doors On A Fair Housing Decision

The recent decision of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York in the much-publicized federal Fair Housing Act case MHANY Management v. Incorporated village of Garden City, 2013 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 172326 (EDNY Dec. 6, 2013) presents a classic example as to how a municipality can run afoul of the federal Fair Housing Act even if none of its officers or employees directly express animus toward members of a protected class or take an action directly against a member of such a class.

MHANY Management stems from a decision of Nassau County to sell unneeded public property. One of the properties the county selected for sale contained various county buildings in an area of the suburban Incorporated village of Garden City which was located near single-family houses. The property was situated in the village's zoning district which only allowed public uses and did not permit residential housing.

The village retained a planning firm to provide a recommendation with regard to the rezoning of the property. The firm recommended that the property be rezoned to allow up to 311 residential units on part of the property and that the construction of multifamily housing be permitted on the property. Those recommendations were initially accepted by a committee appointed by the village to review the zoning for the property, the Superintendent of the village's Buildings Department, and the village's Board of Trustees.

Before enacting the zoning changes, the village held a public hearing at which village residents voiced concerns that multifamily housing would generate traffic and parking problems and place a burden on the local schools. At subsequent hearings, village residents raised further opposition to multifamily housing, with one village resident stating that she "moved here from Brooklyn so that when I walked out of my house I did not turn to my left and see apartment buildings." A flyer distributed throughout the village suggested that any multifamily housing would be used for "affordable housing" and that such would lower property values in the village. None of these statements directly referred to persons of any particular race or national origin and none of these statements were attributed to village officials or employees.

Ultimately, in response to the opposition of its constituents, the village's Board of Trustees enacted a different zoning law than it had initially accepted. In comparison to the initially accepted zoning law, the zoning law that was adopted by the village placed greater restrictions on the number of units that could be built on the property and...