Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Bloomfield neighborhood by-laws show outdated, racist language

http://www.wxyz.com/news/bloomfield-neighborhood-by-laws-show-ban-on-blacks?utm_content=bufferab45e&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Here's another old HOA with a race restrictive covenant. These covenants are part of the hidden history of HOAs that nobody wants to remember. One of the main reasons HOAs started to spread in the years after WWI was the ability to ban anybody other than Caucasians from residential neighborhoods.

1 comment:

Tom Skiba said...

Yes these outrageous covenants still exist in a very small number of communities. More than 97% of communities were built and incorporated after 1970 and the passage of the Civil Rights Act, so only a small fraction have the a chance of containing such a racial covenant. And of course none of those covenants have any force in law or practice as they have been made null by state and federal law.

The challenge is how to remove them. Since most states and most CCR's require a very high voting percentage of the ownership to approve a declaration change, in some cases 100% of owners (not voting owners), changing these covenants is very difficult procedurally. CAI has been suggesting a change to state laws that would allow either a simple board resolution or at most a simple majority vote of owners to remove such clauses that were in direct violation of specific federal laws. Not perfect, but at least it would make the process simpler.