Fair Housing Awardees
The St. Louis Civil Rights Enforcement Agency
reports its April 2 annual kick-off commemorating the 40th anniversary
of the Fair Housing Act was an overwhelming success. The standing
room only crowd at the Historic Old Courthouse received an official
welcome and proclamation from Mayor Francis G. Slay.
The theme for the event was“Affirmatively Furthering
Fair Housing Collectively” taken from the U.S. Housing and Urban
Development’s fair housing policy. CREA Director Ruby Bonner chose
the theme to give meaning to Dr. Martin Luther King’s legacy of
“building multi-cultural, multi-racial coalitions of conscience”
in order to remove all barriers to safe and affordable housing
for all people in all walks of life.
Max
and Colleen Starkloff received CREA’s 2008 Distinguished
Fair Housing Award for their effective advocacy in ending discrimination
against people with disabilities. In accepting the award, Max
stated the Fair Housing Act, as amended in 1988 had certainly
made a difference in providing protection for people with disabilities.
He noted, prior to the amendment, landlords of private property
could refuse to rent to disabled people simply because they didn’t
want them in their building, or because their units were not accessible.
In her acceptance speech, Colleen also noted
changes brought about by the Fair Housing Act but, indicated more
needed be done because the Fair Housing Act Design Guidelines
were established to make living units “useable” with some elements
of “accessible” included. Colleen called upon HUD, advocates and
all stakeholders to come together to update the Fair Housing Act
Design Guidelines by adopting Universal Design as the standard
by which to measure compliance with the Fair Housing Act. She
also called upon HUD and stakeholders to work to increase the
number of accessible units required in HUD funded projects from
7% to a number that more accurately reflects the needs of the
disabled people in our community.
CREA would like to thank everyone who contributed
to the success of its Kickoff, salute the Starkloffs for their
continued advocacy and join them in congratulating Attorney David
Newburger as the new Commissioner for City of St. Louis’ Office
of the Disabled.
CREA
City of St. Louis
