Author: shogenboom

Now that my internship is nearly over, I can say that every day at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination has been unique. On behalf of the Housing Unit I have sent out hundreds of notices for position statements, rebuttals, evidence, and just about everything an investigator could need to help finish a case. I have reviewed several reasonable accommodation policies for housing authorities and condo associations so no one is unfairly denied an accommodation again. I have talked to dozens and dozens of people who felt discriminated against and wanted to file a complaint. In some cases, I wrote up those complaints for them.

There is always the important work of making sure that all of our actions are reflected in our data systems. Inaccurate data systems can absolutely derail an investigation and cause headaches down the road, so logging information is the most important step you can never forget. I co-authored the quarterly report and helped make sure that HUD paid the MCAD for the cases we investigated. Over the course of the summer, I saw how HUD’s shrunken budget made them unable to take on any new investigations, and our intakes grew and grew. What I have learned about the world of work is that your days will always vary. 

I’m told by my supervisors that I have been a huge help to the department and I am going to choose to believe them. Interns matter and the work we do is important. Many offices, including the MCAD, rely on interns to help keep the ship moving. I am incredibly grateful to have worked in a place that made sure I understood the value of the work I was doing. I oversaw so many case records, did so much writing, and answered so many complainants. I might never see the final results of my work, but I was undeniably a part of so many people’s journey through the MCAD. I am now armed with knowledge I would never have learned otherwise, and I will not stop fighting for fair housing. 

I did not take this internship to be thanked, but hearing it does makes me feel like I am doing something right. One woman began to choke up at the end of a forty minute call as she told me she did not know what was going to happen and she did not know why her landlord was being mean to her, but she thanked me for listening and said it felt nice to be heard. We won’t always be able to tell people what they want to hear, and the law won’t always be on their side, but you can treat people fairly and with the respect they were denied. You need to make them feel heard.

My advice for someone who wants to pursue an internship at the MCAD or in the field would be to listen more than you talk. Ask questions when you are unsure because I promise it prevents mistakes in the future. Ask questions when you are curious. Spend time with people working in other parts of the organization and see what they do. 

Most importantly, never forget who you are serving. Social justice work can burn you out and it happens to everyone. What helps is to remember the mission and remember you are not alone. Your work matters, it makes a difference, and you can do it. 

While working in the Housing Unit at the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, I bring the historical frame of reference and the ability to critique that I developed at Brandeis. 

I first became aware of racial housing discrimination, specifically redlining, when I was still in high school. Redlining changed the way America looked forever and through the government’s support of efforts to lock families of color out of white neighborhoods, the most steady and reliable method of wealth accumulation was denied to them. The racial homeownership gap remains a persistent feature of the racial wealth gap, although closing it is not sufficient to close the wealth gap.

The first time I studied this in college was during Professor Knecht’s class where we examined redlining through the lenses of capitalism and gender. I came to work at this agency with an understanding of American legal history that Professor Willrich and Professor Cooper helped me develop. They helped shape my views on legal marginalization, the history of dispute resolution, and what an agency like MCAD should do. Beyond that, my time at Brandeis has just further fleshed out why people discriminate in housing. Brandeis has helped me examine things in a much wider scope through a more comprehensive lens. This is something I owe to my peers as much to my professors. I can thank my work at The Right To Immigration for giving me the experience of listening to peoples’ story and helping them navigate a system completely unfamiliar to them. This is another really crucial skill at the Commission. 

Now, the Commission will occasionally see cases of steering, mortgage discrimination, and discrimination in lending, but housing discrimination is actually much bigger than that. Failure to grant a reasonable accommodation for a disability is one of the leading complaints the commission receives. If you are a potential renter with children, landlords sometimes will not rent to you out of a desire to avoid the de-leading process, or the desire to not even check if there is lead. People who receive rent assistance or social security disability insurance often face landlords who refuse to rent to them, oftentimes out of ignorance for what the law actually says.

One complainant told me that she knew landlords discriminated against her all the time because she had a housing voucher, but this one landlord happened to say it in an email, so she just had to bring it to the Commission. This then makes us stop to think, even if someone did not know they could not refuse to rent to someone because they had a housing voucher, why did they think they could in the first place? Where did their preconceptions about people who need public assistance come from? Why did this landlord not believe the law would protect them? If they knew about the law, would they still have done the same thing or did they simply think they could get away with it? And what about all those cases where the landlord does not make it obvious? Or all those people who do not believe reporting will do any good? This is where the difficult work of education, direct action, and systematic change begins. 

Brandeis prepared me for what I would see at the Commission but it also maintained my blind spots. I am grateful to be coming back to school with a better idea of what I want my education to mean and what I want to do with it.

The goal of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination is to eradicate discrimination based on race, color, creed, national origin, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, and many more categories you might not know you are protected under. Across the commission’s four offices, over 3,000 complaints are investigated each year regarding alleged discrimination in the workplace, housing, public accommodations, lending, and credit. Around 20% of those complaints are for housing discrimination, which is the particular field I work in. Eradicating discrimination in the Commonwealth is a goal as ambitious and necessary as anything a state does, so I am excited to be a part of this mission in as small a way as I am. The other reason I wanted to work in this field was just to observe how people interact with this part of the legal process. Many people, especially in housing, come to the commission without a lawyer and with no intention of getting one. In truth, you do not need one to go through the process and I am proud that the commission does everything to remove barriers of access.

The complaint is what kicks off the entire MCAD process. The commission then serves the party that has allegedly done the discriminating and the investigator can do their own fact-finding with both parties. At the end of the investigation, they will write a disposition stating if it is more likely than not that discrimination occurred (probable cause), and I will be helping to write those this summer. If there is probable cause, there are various actions the MCAD takes depending on how the parties respond. The MCAD always brings parties in for conciliation so they can try and settle the case to avoid the more time-intensive and expensive public hearings. If successful, the complainant can be awarded emotional distress payment, lost wages, a reasonable accommodation, alternate housing, or whatever is the most appropriate for the case. I have seen this process a few times and the negotiations are endlessly fascinating to me. The MCAD also often requires respondents to attend training on the law they violated. These trainings are open to the public and do so much to prevent discrimination before it even occurs, helping thousands upon thousands to know the law in Massachusetts.

My work in the housing unit is primarily to help the investigators. I communicate with parties and try to get information that an investigator needs. I help keep the ship running by sending out notices, writing summaries of cases, and updating the case management system so future people can make sense of all the work we do.

The best example of small steps leading to bigger steps is the policy review I do. Disability is the most common protected category which complaints are based on at the MCAD. In certain settlements when the claim revolves around disability, and specifically denial of a reasonable accommodation, the Housing Authority or private owners need to come up with a reasonable accommodation policy, which they send to us for approval. I am the one to first read it and give feedback. I hope this helps to eradicate discrimination by ensuring people get better treatment in the future. Change is providing justice, discovering the truth, and then making sure we do everything to make sure discrimination ends. One case, one training, one policy review at a time.