I mentioned previously in the racist faces blog a conversation that my business partner and I were having the other day regarding affirmative action, which was actually not the basic point of the conversation, somewhere in the conversation housing discrimination came up, and I need a bit of help from the readers here.
I mentioned to my partner that I once turned a job down flat because the owner of a property told me that I couldn’t rent to Mexicans, at all, if I managed his apartment complex. When I asked him why, he told me that renting to one Mexican person was like renting to their entire family, before you knew it they’d have all of their cousin’s, uncles aunts, sisters, sisters mother in law, and so on all living in a 2 bedroom apartment.
I asked him if that wasn’t possible with any race, and didn’t we still have options if it happened? The lease says that you are not allowed to have the same guest stay on the premises for more than 14 days in any calendar year, so if it did happen, with anyone, of any race, the landlord has the right to evict, for cause.
Now if the landlord doesn’t want to fight in court, or have to prove that there are unauthorized tenants living on the property, they can also file a 30 day no cause eviction where I live, stating simply that they want their property back, and giving no reason, giving any reason however will nullify this sort of eviction and get it tossed out of court. The reasoning behind this, in Oregon, is to allow the tenant 14 days to correct a problem where a ‘for cause’ eviction notice is concerned, of course this is all simply the law according to Cathy, I have no law degree, just a bit of property management experience, so don’t gather advice here, I don’t know what I’m talking about …. Etc.
Anyway, the other option would be, to rent to these unauthorized relatives. Or atleast that seems like a feasible option to me, if they can’t rent, or aren’t rent worthy for whatever reason, well you had them fill out a rental application, you tell them to go ahead and put the apartment they are unauthorized in down on the form, and now you’re back to plan A. However, you can tell the judge that you did TRY to rent to them, they just don’t qualify, or whatever, but see, you can prove where they live, because they put it on the application, making for a much smoother hearing day.
Anyway, Mr. Property owner wasn’t real interested in my solutions to his racism, no Mexicans, end of story. So I passed on the job. I probably should have done a bit more, but that was then, this is now… so several years later, I’m talking to my partner, and I’m telling him this story, and another story involving discrimination against children (The sign said kids couldn’t play basketball in the parking lot… It should have said NO Basketball in the parking lot.. Woulda saved the property owner about 10 k 
)
My business partner, agreed with … guess…. Who! Mr. Racist Property Owner. What do you mean ? I asked him! You think it’s ok for the property owner to just out and out refuse to rent to Mexicans? At first he said yes, it is the property owners property, so he should be allowed to decide who to rent to.
Well it just so happens he was out looking for property recently himself, and I turned the question for him. Let’s say he found the perfect property overlooking the ocean, and you know for a property overlooking the ocean, in the area he wants to live, he’s going to wait QUITE sometime for it to come open.
So he’s been waiting and waiting, and finally the space is for rent. A beautiful house, everything he’d hoped for. He goes, he applies, he qualifies, and they say no thank you. Now truth be told my partner is a white male, so this isn’t likely going to happen to him any time soon, but just imagine for a moment how it would feel…
He said it would be wrong, but that it’s not the governments job to get involved, or rather it is there job, but that it shouldn’t be, because the government at the federal level needs to butt out more often, and stay out of matters that involve our privacy, rights, and property.
Now I do agree here, usually. If you’ve ever read anything I’ve written regarding the recent online gambling ban, you know I really really agree that the government minds a bit to much of our business. So not being a REALLY political girl, I asked him. What should be done instead? We can’t just allow racism, just make it ok… what should be done instead of federal fair housing standards?
He told me that with or without the federal standards, it’s going to happen anyway.. There’s going to be racism. I believe that to be true as well, but what has that got to do with it? Because it’s going to happen anyway .. We may as well just make it legal?
Lastly he said that he wouldn’t want to lose the house because the landlord had to rent to a minority because of some quota, now here I think he’s just a bit confused with affirmative action, so we’ll let that one slide, or I will anyway.
In the end, we agreed to disagree, or shall we say I turned up the radio really really loud and ended the conversation. I’m just really not a debater. This man is my business partner, meaning he owns half of this website. I do all of the writing, but he does A LOT of the behind the scenes stuff. I don’t see him as a racist man, although perhaps I’m just seeing what I want to see…
I laughed toward the end of our conversation and told him he knew what my next blog post would be about and here it.. Guys.. Should the government mandate racial discrimination when it comes to housing? If so, why. If not why. And if not, what should be done instead?
If I’ve misunderstood my partner, or misquoted him in anyway, or he’d like to stand up for his thoughts here, I’m sure you’ll see some comments from him in the comment area of the blog
American Woman.
