US 'fair chance' laws help ex-convicts find homes

• Incarceration can be a lifelong obstacle to housing 
• Cities and states pass laws barring discrimination
• Public housing still a concern, campaigners say

WASHINGTON - By the time Lee "Taqwaa" Bonner got out of prison in California, he had spent 30 years behind bars and was unsure where to go.

He stayed at a halfway house for three months, but then had to find a home. Everywhere he went, doors were slammed in his face.

"I tried to move in with my younger sister, until (an official) informed me that I was putting her housing in jeopardy," Bonner, 56, told Context.

Bonner's sister lived in federally subsidized housing in Oakland, and having a convicted felon move in with her would have put her lease in jeopardy. His mother lived in a privately-owned apartment complex, but her lease had a similar provision.

Like millions of formerly incarcerated people in the U.S., Bonner was barred from staying with family by housing policies and practices that critics say fuel homelessness and further interactions with the criminal justice system, often through minor offenses like sleeping in public spaces.

But a growing number of "fair chance" laws are seeking to stop such discriminatory policies, ease the housing crisis and reduce reoffending.

The U.S. has one of the world's highest rates of incarceration, with 1.9 million people incarcerated - about 0.5% of the population - according to the nonprofit Prison Policy Initiative.

People who have served time in U.S. prisons or jails are almost 10 times more likely to be homeless than the general public, it says.

"It's still really, really difficult for people with arrest and conviction histories to find safe, stable and affordable housing," said Eric Sirota, housing justice director at the Shriver Center on Poverty Law, an advocacy organization.

"There are repercussions of involvement in the criminal legal system that go on in harsh ways and sometimes fairly indefinitely."

Fair chance housing laws

Bonner ended up living in his car while applying for housing, only to be asked on applications whether he had been convicted of a felony.

"I marked the box yes, not realizing I had screened myself out," recalled Bonner, who now works as a housing advocate for Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, a California-based nonprofit campaigning for the rights of incarcerated people.

Bonner finally leased his own home after the cities of Berkeley and Oakland passed "fair chance" housing laws in 2020.

These made it illegal to ask about a tenant's criminal history, refuse to rent on those grounds, or to prevent a tenant housing a family member with a criminal history.

The California city of Richmond was one of the first to adopt fair chance housing laws in 2016, campaigners said, followed the next year by Seattle in the northwest.

In the northeast, New Jersey in 2021 became the first U.S. state to pass a similar law.

A state-wide bill was introduced in California in February, with bills also pending in Los Angeles and New York.

In March, a federal court appeal case over Seattle's law ruled that completely barring landlords from asking about criminal histories violated their free speech rights, but upheld the city's ban on using such information to discriminate against potential tenants.

Other areas also within the court's jurisdiction, which covers nine states including California, will now have to consider the decision, said Marie Claire Tran-Leung, a senior staff attorney with the National Housing Law Project.

"Although the court struck the inquiry provision, a landlord who asks about criminal history and subsequently denies housing will be hard-pressed to make a convincing case that the denial was unrelated to criminal history," she said.

Racial justice

Campaigners see the reforms as a racial justice issue, as Black people are overrepresented in U.S. prisons and jails and are more likely to be homeless after their release.

The nationwide push grew out of efforts to eliminate criminal history questions on employment applications, said Xavier Johnson, director of policy justice at the Just Cities Institute, a Berkeley-based nonprofit.

"People were telling stories about living on the streets and in cars because folks were unwilling to rent to them. Many had been out of the criminal justice system for 20 or 30 years and had served their time," Johnson said.

Ensuring people can find a place to live after prison helps keep them off the streets and allows them to rebuild successful lives, said New York City Council member Keith Powers, sponsor of its fair chance bill.

"It is good for them and good for the city," he said.

Yet for landlords, criminal screening remains a critical tool, Nicole Upano, an assistant vice president at the National Apartment Association, an industry group, said in an email.

"Limiting screening increases risk for housing providers, their communities, residents and staff," she said.

"It is paramount that housing providers retain the ability to screen all prospective residents to evaluate risk and ensure the long-term viability of rental communities."

Living on the streets

While new laws can guide how private landlords use criminal background checks, they do not affect the 1.2 million households living in federally subsidized housing.

Last year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) released new guidance urging its local public housing authorities to be as open as possible to applicants with criminal records – outside mandatory denials for current illegal drug use, methamphetamine production or inclusion on a sex offender registry.

But campaigners want to see tougher action to roll back criminal screening checks.

A HUD spokesperson said background screening had a role in ensuring safety in federally assisted housing, but "too many people who are currently living stable and productive lives continue to be excluded from HUD programs due to their criminal histories."

The agency will be "taking steps to address this" in coming weeks, the spokesperson said, but declined to offer additional details.

At present, public housing authorities have "nearly unlimited discretion" to reject people based on criminal screenings that often go back five years or longer, or even just an arrest, said Wanda Bertram, a spokesperson for Prison Policy Initiative.

"Your whole family can be punished because of something you did years ago," Bertram said.

(Reporting by Carey L. Biron; Editing by Jon Hemming and Katy Migiro.)