| Sunday, August 25, 2002 - 11:18 pm I came across this article today. A lot of woman tenants get harrassed all the time by landlords, supers and landlord's goons, and/or business partners here in NYC. I know because it's been done to me. It's a form of DOMESTIC VIOLENCE. I want to see FEDERAL Domestic Violence Laws applied to the housing cases where landlords are attempting to harrass women out of affordable apartments. (and even un-affordable ones) http://insurancejustice.com/jf/hs/hos/ext/pp_coma.html Here's some of the article, it's long- Renters say sex sometimes part of the deal BY CHARLES LASZEWSKI Pioneer Press For Rent: Midway area, 2BR, ht pd, $725. Must have sex with landlord The advertisements in the classified sections of the daily newspaper aren't that explicit. But for some women searching for an affordable place to live in the Twin Cities, they might as well be. The region's housing market, one of the tightest in the country, is having some ugly effects. Low-income women, many of them single mothers, are being preyed on by landlords, apartment caretakers and others who demand sexual favors in return for making repairs, overlooking lease violations or forgiving late rent checks. Putting a number to the trend is difficult, partly because no one is responsible for tracking complaints. Even the government agencies that enforce housing laws have sketchy information, at best This is a very large problem that is just being uncovered,'' said Beverly Balos, supervising attorney at the University of Minnesota's Law Center. "It's hard for these women to come forward," said Balos, who has assisted on three such lawsuits and written extensively on violence against women. "They are embarrassed, ashamed and afraid of losing their housing.'' A Pioneer Press investigation indicates that sexual harassment, from suggestive remarks or touching to outright demands for sex, is sometimes part of the price of renting an apartment or home in the Twin Cities. For example: • At least 15 landlords or their employees have been accused in Minnesota of sexually harassing renters. Cases also have been reported in Wisconsin. • One St. Paul landlord has been accused in six lawsuits, including three filed this year, of sexually harassing more than a dozen of his tenants. In one of those suits, a former girlfriend and business partner claimed his practice of sexually harassing vulnerable tenants posed a serious risk to their lucrative real estate business. • At least eight Minnesota women have won claims or settlements against other landlords or property managers whom they accused of sexual harassment. • State and local human rights agencies have also fielded dozens of complaints from tenants who claim they were sexually harassed or abused by landlords or their employees. LANDLORD ACCUSED St. Paul landlord David Beaudet, who owns 31 houses and apartments in St. Paul and Minneapolis, says he has never sexually harassed any of his tenants. But some of his renters say differently. Beaudet, 60, has been sued five times by female tenants who claim he sexually harassed them while they lived in properties he owned. One of those renters, Stephanie Luckett, agreed to settle her lawsuit against Beaudet in January 2000. The terms of the settlement had been secret but were recently revealed in Ramsey County District Court, where Luckett pleaded guilty to a charge that she committed welfare fraud by not reporting the settlement money. According to the criminal complaint against her, Beaudet paid Luckett $15,000 in January 2000, another $10,000 the following August and $667 each month since. Four other lawsuits brought against Beaudet by other tenants are still pending in U.S. District Court. Luckett, who agreed as part of the settlement not to discuss the case, declined to be interviewed by the Pioneer Press for this story. Court documents that Luckett filed in connection with her lawsuit allege she was sexually harassed from the day she first met Beaudet to discuss renting an apartment he owned at 540 Charles Ave. in St. Paul, and the behavior escalated over the next couple years. Luckett claimed in her lawsuit that Beaudet stared and winked at her during their initial meeting. When she later became a tenant and fell behind in her rent, Beaudet started calling her once or twice a week, asking her to go out to a movie or to join him for a drink. On one occasion in May 1997, Luckett said, Beaudet showed up unexpectedly at her home, let himself in using his key, sat next to her on a couch and caressed her leg while asking whether she needed any repairs done in the apartment. Luckett, then 36, said she was afraid she and her three children would be evicted if she objected to his overtures. In the lawsuit, she said Beaudet took her to vacant apartments he owned and sexually assaulted her four times over the next several months. Beaudet testified before the case was settled that he never sexually harassed Luckett. Under questioning from Luckett's attorney, he also denied any inappropriate behavior toward five other women who had also rented properties from him. Beaudet declined requests by the Pioneer Press for an interview to discuss in detail the allegations that have been brought against him. But during a brief encounter in front of his home, Beaudet told a reporter he has done nothing wrong. "It's very easy to say anything these days,"' Beaudet said before referring all other questions about the allegations to his lawyer, Thomas Hutchinson. "Dave has denied them under oath," Hutchinson said. "He remains adamant." PARTNER ALSO SUES Allegations of sexual harassment of tenants also figured prominently in a lawsuit filed against Beaudet in 1997 by Mary Lou Whirley, his former business partner and his ex-girlfriend. In her lawsuit, Whirley claimed that Beaudet's "pattern of seeking sexual contact with female tenants" was threatening their business. Her attorney said his behavior, "such as touching a tenant's breasts and buttocks, could give rise to civil claims of battery." If Beaudet continued to be active in the business, lawyer David Schoenecker argued, such conduct would probably be repeated. "These vulnerable women will be subjected to his unwanted sexual advances and the partnership will be exposed to possible liability claims arising from his conduct," Schoenecker wrote in a memorandum to the court. To support those arguments, Whirley's lawyers produced statements from five former tenants who all claimed to have been sexually harassed by Beaudet. One of those women, Francesca Nixon, said in a sworn affidavit that Beaudet not only harassed her sexually, but insisted she pay him more rent than he was supposed to get under her federal Section 8 subsidized-housing contract. Nixon, a 28-year-old single mother of four children, said she rented a house from Beaudet at 1072 Iglehart Ave. in St. Paul for $557 a month. Of that amount, $504 was to be paid by Section 8, leaving her to pay only $53 a month on her own — a figure that public housing officials had set based on her income and ability to pay. But shortly after she and her children moved into the house in 1996, Nixon said, Beaudet demanded she pay an extra $250 — in cash — every month. If she objected to the side payments, Nixon said, Beaudet would threaten to evict her. Because she was being charged more rent than she was obligated or able to pay, Nixon said, she soon began falling behind in her payments. That's when the sexual harassment began, she said. "One time when I told him that I didn't know what I could do to catch up on the rent, Dave patted me on the leg very suggestively and said that we could work it out,'' Nixon stated in her affidavit. "I could tell that Dave meant that if I had sex with him, he would help me get my rent caught up," she said. "I am not that kind of woman, and I wouldn't have sex with him." Not long after, Nixon said, Beaudet began proceedings to evict her from the house. In his own affidavit, Beaudet denied sexually harassing Nixon or any of the other four female tenants named in the case. He also denied asking Nixon to pay extra rent. Whirley's lawsuit was settled in 1998, when Beaudet agreed to pay Whirley $850,000 for her share of their business. Since then, Beaudet has been the target of four more lawsuits by women who claim he sexually harassed them while they were tenants. In her lawsuit filed last year, Rosa Gipson, a 54-year-old widow, claims that Beaudet forced her to have sex from September 1999 through July 2001 in exchange for forgiving overdue rent and late charges for a house she rented at 390 Sherburne Ave. in St. Paul. Gipson said Beaudet threatened to evict her if she refused. Three other women also filed federal lawsuits against Beaudet last month. Rochelle Nunn, 29; Kelly Scott, 33; and Sharon Neal, 36, all claim that Beaudet sexually harassed and assaulted them while they were tenants in several of his St. Paul rental properties. Each woman said that Beaudet threatened to evict her and her children if she refused to comply with his demands. Nunn, a mother of four who works as a youth counselor, had fallen behind on the $1,300 monthly rent for a two-bedroom rambler at 656 Carroll Ave. The house, valued at $56,000, according to Ramsey County property records, is just a block down the street from Beaudet's own residence. "I kept thinking, 'If I'm nicer to him, I could stay, because he said "We can work on it," ' '' Nunn said, sighing with disdain. "He touched my body parts. I did it for my kids.'' Jerome Ritter, a St. Paul lawyer representing Nunn and the other three women, said they had little choice but to do as their landlord told them. "It's no different than if somebody comes up to you in a dark alley with a baseball bat and says, 'Give me your wallet,' " Ritter said. "You do it.'' In addition to monetary damages, Nunn, Scott and Neal are asking the court to order Beaudet to attend treatment for "sexually assaultive'' behavior. They also want to require him to post a sign at his properties informing tenants of their rights under the Fair Housing Act, federal law that forbids housing discrimination. "I just don't want to see him hurt anybody anymore,'' Nunn said. "He needs to be put to shame. He ought to be ashamed over the things he does.'' Beaudet's lawyer, Hutchinson, said his client "vigorously denies" the allegations in all four of the lawsuits. He said the tenants filed the suits only after Beaudet went to court to recover overdue rent or to evict them. MEASURING PROBLEM At least 15 landlords or their employees have been accused of sexual harassment in Minnesota over the past several years, according to a Pioneer Press sampling of lawsuits, HUD records and complaints filed with other state and local agencies. Some have been accused more than once. But many working on behalf of tenants who are being sexually harassed believe the problem is far greater than those numbers would suggest. And they say it's growing. James Wilkinson, an attorney for the Housing Discrimination Law Project in Minneapolis, remembers when the agency got its first sexual harassment case four years ago. Six months later, it got a second one. Since then, the complaints have climbed steadily. So far this year, Wilkinson said, his staff has opened about 10 new cases. "Now we always have at least one under investigation," said Wilkinson, whose agency specializes in housing-related law as part of the Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis. Nationally, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development says it has fielded 550 sexual harassment complaints since 1992. Those totals do not include breakdowns for Minnesota or Wisconsin, but a Pioneer Press analysis of another HUD database identified at least 11 harassment complaints from the two states since 1996. For every tenant who does complain, many others say nothing because they are afraid they and their children will lose their homes, said Nicole Forkenbrock Lindemyer, another Housing Discrimination Law Project attorney specializing in harassment cases. "We're just scratching the surface," she said. "If there is one victim, there's usually another, and another and another. Just follow the landlord and he'll point you to his victims.'' Those who would sexually harass renters rarely target just one tenant, Forkenbrock Lindemyer said. "They are predatory," she said. "We've seen cases where the owner trolls for victims at homeless shelters or on the street. They are looking for victims as desperate as possible. She knows what it's like to have her kids sleeping in a car." Many believe it is no co-incidence that sexual harassment complaints have climbed as Minnesota's affordablehousing crisis has worsened. For the past several years, the Twin Cities' rental housing market has been one of the tightest in the United States, with vacancy rates of 1 percent to 2 percent, well below the 5 percent threshold considered to be healthy for a community. Although vacancy rates began to climb again this year, much of the gain has come at the upper end of the market. For houses and apartments considered "affordable" for families with annual incomes of $24,000 or less, the vacancy rate is still hovering at about 2 percent. "The shortage in affordable housing persists despite rising vacancy rates in the Twin Cities,'' said Shawna Nelsen-Tobechukwu of the Family Housing Fund, a nonprofit organization that supports affordable housing in Minnesota. "Availability does not mean affordability." For lower-income renters, particularly single mothers without many other options, that can mean a difficult decision if they are sexually harassed. "A woman has to choose between making the family homeless or giving in to the landlord,'' said Laura Jelinek, an attorney who has won two sexual harassment lawsuits against landlords. "Women have this horrible choice." MANAGER ACCUSED to read the rest go to: http://insurancejustice.com/jf/hs/hos/ext/pp_coma.html
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| Sunday, August 25, 2002 - 11:21 pm From our friends at the Pioneer Press in Minnesota- THE ISSUE What is sexual harassment in housing? Sexual harassment is defined as unwelcome sexual advances, demands for sex, or other words or acts of a sexual nature made by a landlord or an employee toward a tenant at a single-family home, apartment or homeless shelter. What does the law say about sexual harassment in housing? It is a form of discrimination and it is illegal. Violators may be sued, reported to enforcement agencies or otherwise held responsible. Even if you have given in to demands for sex in the past, you have the right to stop it from happening again. Examples of sexual harassment by a housing provider include: • Asking a tenant to trade sex for rent or repairs. • Threatening to evict a tenant because she refuses to have sex. • Sexual comments that threaten or offend a tenant; intimate touching. What should I do if someone sexually harasses me? If you are threatened or assaulted, call 911 and tell the police what happened. You may also contact an attorney to find out more about your options. If you are sexually harassed by your housing provider, firmly tell him to stop. Write down what happened while it is still fresh in your memory. RESOURCES Housing Discrimination Law Project Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis2929 Fourth Ave. S.Minneapolis, MN 55408(612) 827-3774 Housing Equality Law Project Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services300 Minnesota BuildingFourth and Cedar streetsSt. Paul, MN 55101(651) 222-5863 Office of Fair Housing U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development(800) 424-8590 or local HUD office in Minneapolis at (612) 370-3000 Minnesota Department of Human Rights (651) 296-5663
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| Tuesday, September 03, 2002 - 10:23 pm You should have entitled this discussion "Sexual Harassment of Tenants" Yarrow.
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| Tuesday, September 03, 2002 - 10:33 pm btw- sexual harassment is not just a problem for females. I know of a young student who's landlandy would walk in the bathroom while he was towelling off to, "look for a leak" and who at other times would rub against him and make sexual comments about his anatomy. He was really disgusted by the "Fat Beast from Below", as he describes her, hitting on him and making excuses to walk in on him while he's naked but he likes that she let's him pay the rent late, gives him food, etc. and the apartment is affordably nice and he's afraid he won't find a comparable place to live.
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| Wednesday, September 04, 2002 - 12:18 am You shouldn't tell me what to write for my headings. It's: Learning from the Ladies in Minnesota. Maybe I should have used women instead of Ladies? My next heading is: Papa Don't Preach!! Are you the LANDLORD of titles Ronin? Next thing you will be charging me rent by the line. As for "young student"? Call him young gigilo. How come he doesn't lock the bathroom door and lets her cook for him? How can you expect me to shed a single tear for this scoundrel? this..this adventurer? Did you forget to mention that he is engaged to her, the alleged landlady? Does this "young student" even actually exist? This was a cheap ploy to whitewash the fact that the harrassement of women is enabled by the courts to drive women, mothers, daughters, aunts, grandmothers,etc. out of affordable housing. Women living alone are often targeted by unethical landlords and their goons. I am speaking from my own experience, I'm not speaking from some third hand telephone game fabricated misrepresentation. The women in the article were being sexually harrased. While it made that paper it's not news to any woman. It's old hat for us, we deal with sexual discrimination and sexual harrassment on a daily basis. Just because you don't want to hear about it doesn't mean it's not going on. Are you saying " How dare those women take up a whole apartment to themselves and live alone"? This is about boundaries and the ability to have a decent place to live with out being terrorized by the owner or anyone else.Men do not as a rule respect women's boundaries, why? They don't think we should have them, just like you think I should have called the post something else. May I suggest some reading material? That is in case you have some free time when you are not busy censoring my headings or some other uppity woman's. "A Room of One's Own." by Virginia Woolf.
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| Wednesday, September 04, 2002 - 12:38 am ...and furthermore, did it ever occur to you that NOT having a home, being homeless, with the absence of a home is domestic violence? The lack of domesticity is causing violence for about 80,000 New Yorkers. (I wonder what percentage are women?) I could go as far to say that the city's real estate machine perpetrates this violence upon women and must be held accountable. As in financial compensation. Overcharging tenants is a form of domestic violence. Using harrasment tactics against any tenant is domestic violence. but the fines ought to be doubled, no tripled when it's a woman that they are doing it to. It is certainly Economic Violence. Many women wind up homeless fleeing violence, physical and emotional abuse in their homes. The perpetrators of the violence and insanity get to keep a roof over their heads. It is insult to injury that then in wanting to stay alive that many victimized, battered women literally have no where to go except a subway station or a doorway.
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| Wednesday, September 04, 2002 - 11:41 am Yarrow you have consistently ranted at participants in this forum with non-sequitor ad hominem attacks. And you have been asked to stop several times. Please don't do it again or I will be forced to block your IP. This is an uncensored forum, but your ranting has chilled several others from participating. It must stop. You have made some excellent contributions to the forum and it would be a shame to have to block you. But screaming down other participants is not acceptable forum behavior. If it upsets you that I recommended a more informative title I apologize, but I was under the impression that you were trying to get informative information out to the public, otherwise why put a title at all? A title about Minnesota women does not convey that the subject matter is sexual harassment of tenants which is a worthy and relevent topic. To denigrate the sexual harassment of a male tenant is inexcusable. For you to call him a gigilo is as inappropriate as someone else calling the Minnesota women prostitutes. For you to assume that he has a relationship with her is as demeaning as assuming that the Minnesota women had a relationship with their landlords. Harassment of tenants, male or female, sexual or otherwise, is something that must be stopped. If you want to discriminate against males then I vehemently oppose your position. Period. Ronin
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| Wednesday, September 04, 2002 - 04:03 pm Don't put me down and slander me because I simply wrote something here about women and housing. I'll take your comments from whence it came. Where in any of the tenant's groups is this issue being brought out into the open? The majority of the people (tenants) at the RGB hearing were women. You're attacking me, shaming me and slandering me because I wrote about the harrassement of women? Male landlords in the article were violating Federal Laws. They did discrimnate against women as per the article. I posted the source. It goes back to how dare a woman have an opinion, let alone an apartment or property. My information came directly from a newspaper, I liked the idea and thought it would be relevant for other women and tenants.I question the information you provided which was as you accused me of "non-sequitor ad hominem". If this "young student" is truly suffering perhaps you can help him?
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| Wednesday, September 04, 2002 - 04:25 pm Non sequitor means irrelevent or off-topic. Ad hominem has been explained to you by various people on this forum at least three times. It means personal attacks. It's a tactic that you have used many times to shut down thoughful debate. It ends here. I like the information about sexual harassment you posted to start this discussion, everything else following that you wrote was garbage and speaks more to a lack of self-esteem on your part than anything else. Consider yourself banned from the forum for the next 90 days.
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| Saturday, September 07, 2002 - 09:33 am i agree with you that yarrow is ridiculous. she seems to have problems with peole in position of authority that most likely stem from childhood. i would warn her but dont ban her yet. give her a chance
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| Thursday, September 12, 2002 - 10:49 pm Hi, Thanks for your input. She had been warned several times but kept doing the same thing. The only way to stop the constant abuse of the forum by her is to ban her. After being banned the person banned can only send their abusive diatribes via email where they are kill filtered by the server unread and without disrupting an ongoing discussion. It makes for a much more productive and interesting forum. Frankly, if I wasn't the person in charge of this forum, after that chain of abuse without provocation, I think I would have gone elsewhere without looking back. I took a look at some of the other diatribes and that is indeed what some people did. Never come back. If I didn't ban her after this extreme example of absurdity, then it would look like this forum approves of cheap anti-debate tactics. On this forum is a discussion in which I criticized another forum for allowing and encouraging such cheap tactics and non-sequitor attacks. I can't very well ignore my own statements. A 90 day cooling off period may make a world of difference. And if not..... we'll see. I didn't make it permanent because she has posted some good stuff in the past. Ronin
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| Monday, October 07, 2002 - 04:12 pm This whole thread was insane. The ban should have been permanent! Yarrow needs a shrink. Bad.
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