my name is steve ron i get my privilege to represent the city of springfield on this case there's i think one primary issue the plaintiffs argue and the district court agreed that if five unrelated non disabled persons can live together in a single family home under the ordinance but a similar group of disabled persons living in a family group home must be at least six hundred feet apart then the ordinance is discriminatory on its face frankly the city of priest with that agrees with what the that's what the law says no a priest that if that were what the law says it would be discriminatory what is the space rule the space rule is six hundred feet but where we take issue is that in the definition of family if the plaintiff's interpretation of family is correct the ordinance is indefensible use it legal in springfield for a widow and a foster child to live in a single family home i think that would be considered a family as  for their not related they're related by a lawyer not related widow and a foster child not adopted are they allowed to live together i think the burden of your position is that they are not and then my follow up question is has springfield ever prosecuted springfield ever tried to get them to leave i do not know that that has not about  me a single unmarried couple very frequent occurrence unmarried people living together is that illegal in springfield they're within six hundred feet of any other home to my knowledge there's never been a case in that regard and so your your position seems to be that there are a lot of things that happen every day and are accepted that are normal s c legal but there have never been any prosecutions of anybody unless they were  there's there's been no showing of that you know look this this has not has the city ever told any group of unrelated to adults that they can't live together i do not unless those unrelated to talks were disabled because we know the city has told unrelated disabled adults that they can't live together i do and that's disparate treatment in enforcement even if the ordinance means what you say it means there is nothing in the record that supports your conclusion you would need to put in the record something to show that your current view of the ordinance using force with respect to non disabled people we because otherwise what the record shows is that disabled people are told they can't live there and non disabled people aren't respectfully i disagree your honor this is not an as applied case this is an on the i don't even know what this distinction is the question is whether there is discrimination between disabled and on disabled we know from the record that disabled people are being told that since they are unrelated they can't live within six hundred feet of any other single family rather well without any evidence any reason to believe that springfield as ever told unrelated people that it looks like far as i know you haven't offered to produce that good evidence that definition of family is not dependent on the evidence it's dependent upon the legal definition for this court to determine to no avail and the evidence of how it is t forced may determine whether or not there's any problem or let me ask you about the local law has any court ever interpreted the ordinance the way you do any court in illinois ever interpreted a similar ordinance of any other jurisdiction the way you do this is a case of first impression as any court anywhere in the united states ever interpreted any similar ordinance  neuer i'm not aware of that these ordinances are very common the fact that no court in a nation of three hundred plus million people has ever interpreted an ordinance the way you you just something about that interpretation i've not seen an ordinance like this your honor where someone interprets the language of five persons not all so related to mean five unrelated people that's a rather convoluted way of saying five unrelated people and that's the basis of our position is that if it meant five unrelated people why doesn't it say five hundred related people as it does throughout the country there are many cases the case of the city of chicago heights that was cited by the plaintiffs does say five unrelated people are ordinance does not say five unrelated people and the fact that it we don't know we haven't gotten to discover it to her to determine whether or not it's equitably applied but that's not the case here in this case the plaintiffs are asking this court to make a legal determination of what family is and it is a fake case of first impression with not a first impression and biting at several but it was just some residents complained to the group home here they were about the value of their property that's why they say the houses look just alike in every to others just by they didn't know about across the street there is another outfit that had a group home and this is why these ordinances even appeared is because there's concern in the neighborhood about their property value and if that gets pretty one there may be more coming because obviously it's doing a very wonderful service for those individuals who have that opportunity to live there under the care your honor and i would and that's that's the problem that's why they've put up the space they thought because they didn't want to group the group homes your honor i would suggest that that's only part of the reason why the six hundred foot is there it's not to protect the property values of the other people it's to protect the first home that was there in this case the sparkle moved in it established itself and they have the right as we as evidence shows that you don't want to put a bunch of homes together because that's de facto institutionalisation it's clustering so the six hundred feet protects the spark home that's already there we've not there's no attention has been paid to the rights of the disabled persons in the spark home who have the right to say yes we want to neighborhood setting here and it's been violated not by five hundred feet but by a hundred fifty feet with another home moving in we think that the the neighbors that are they are the disabled persons in the group home that are there also have the right and if you look at the evident when this was a stablished the plaintiff's expert mr robber said yes a six hundred foot spacing is necessary to prevent cluster and do the other was it was the other name of the other company spark stark did they complain they've not been involved in the case ok but that what you described they would be the ones that came forward and say hey we are violating the through they have to they do have a right i would maintain that to have their boundaries prove protect who i go back to my other point that this is raised by three neighbors i don't remember them and there were a number of neighbors that did  it express a concern about too many group homes burned in the neighborhood and it was not and should've that it wasn't a concern about the disabled is more concerned about what's going to happen to their neighborhood that was of course dumped into their space that's all that yes and that's the reasonable accommodation procedure so to to reach they had to there was no evidence in the case presented as to any effect that it would have on the other hollows the reasonable accommodation isn't well if you don't meet the six hundred foot rule you waive the six hundred foot rule there that's just a way of saying the six hundred foot rule is per se illegal no court the courts have held that spacing requirements can be legal so they're not arguing that it's per se illegal they just say that when it's violated you may please the court my name's tree so long and i represent the united states i will address the city's arguments regarding clean it's intentional discrimination claim mr kennedy will address the failure to accommodate claim which provides a separate and independent basis for up negligible likelihood of success on the merits the district court's reading a family is the most natural reading of the ordinance where you have a fan up to five individuals five unrelated individuals could make up a family be related but that's not necessary that's an analogy to that would be if i offered a scholarship for up to five students not from all the same schools so i could give a scholarship to three students from two schools or three students from three different schools my contrast the city isn't current interpretation of family would produce and possible and potentially illegal results as i well know they would not constitute a family at all i am would not be allowed to live in any single family home because at all because the spacing requirement doesn't apply to them but they would not be allowed they would not be considered family undisputed fact that the residents of the noble home if they were evicted pending this case they would suffer irreparable injury the court can find that the district court did not abused its discretion that specifically rely on the fact that the city has the c p u up procedure little did mr lobert know that it since you know twenty eight years later the city has not issued a single exception from the spac for small homes for persons with disabilities with us toward residence would certainly violate the pair housing act more relevant is mr lubbers testimony from the planning and zoning commission hearing in this matter where it's in a neighborhood and it and this is the only house they could find you know and so that's where they are they invaded someone else's space and the city with the f h a whatever regulations it has says you you can do that examples of people who are not related for example and i know when it's near a college they don't want seven guys partying and running a place so i guess that pretty spread out these days and we we agree with the district court that up to five and related people could be a family we're not arguing that up to seven could be a family it's whatever the city wrote in the ordinance has a definite your family if they allow five and related individuals without disabilities to live together in a single family home they should not treat a home for up to five  individuals with disabilities any differently because of their disability course in that case you know people with disabilities take a lot of extra attention and therefore there's numbers they have to be limited just by the fact of what they're doing so ye please the court i'm tom kennedy surrogate hunt and i represent the plaintiffs in this case and we want to argue the judge mills whose decision was not clearly erroneous because there was at least some evidence that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail on the merits in this case i think it's important to address what the city doesn't say the city doesn't say that the accommodation that the plaintiffs are requesting the right to live in the community actually to click continue to live in the community would cost the city any money it didn't say that it would fundamentally alter its zoning scheme in any way it didn't say that the residents of the noble home created any safety problems in the community it didn't say that the plaintiff didn't really need to live in the noble home when the plane of said the home was fully accessible i can go in my wheelchair anywhere in the house outside the house in the backyard and so forth it didn't say that wasn't true it didn't say that the requested accommodation wasn't absolutely necessary for these people with disabilities to live in the home of their choice and the thing that makes this case somewhat different than other cases your honor is that in this case the families selected the noble home and signed the leases the provider not individual advocacy group the families themselves selected this home and and and made arrangements for their residence to their sons and daughters or their brothers and sisters to live there or that is there or are they reacting yes they are renting a room so of the only issue as far as i can tell is that the city claims that the plaintiffs failed to demonstrate at the hearing and in the papers that they submitted that the residence of the noble home did not have an adverse impact on the sparc home the spark home is the springfield association for retarded citizens long time existing organizations springfield their home was across the street and a couple of houses down the testimony was that there has never been any interaction in the previous two and a half years between any of those residents any of the staff or any of the administrators of the spark with the noble home except for one or two occasions early in in two thousand and fourteen when a spark resident got lost and came to the noble home knocked on the door went in the door they sent him back home there were two interactions maybe in two thousand and fourteen otherwise at all times during the day when people are at work or at night when they're home or on weekends when they're out recreating there is absolutely no interaction at all between the residents of the noble home and the was that the existence of a group home does not have an adverse impact on property values home sales safety noise light any of those things what was the real interests problem the realtor next door i don't know what her problem was your honor it was very weird the realtor testified that she was selling the home next door she was able to sell the home next door she got the price she was asking but she said that she had to hold her open house during the week not on weekends because she wanted to be there when the residents work there and then she said that one of the residents in the home made of you no big noise and scared the children the only person who was at the home during the day is the late plaintiff a d who is a non verbal person who can say a total of three words one of which is bang bang which he does at a television that he watches during the day can't say anything else those are the only three things any and he's old and infirm and now now deceased but he can't say anything loudly so that was just completely preposterous i mean just nuts at any the she testified that you know she thought it was a bad bad deal that they're coming into the community i don't know why and i don't know what the beef was because she sold the home at the price she was asking so it didn't adversely affect property values in the neighborhood and mr labrat and submitted a paper in testimony that it doesn't adversely affect property values so than the noble home doesn't adversely affected the property values of the folks that sparked it doesn't affect their safety it doesn't affect doesn't cause knowings it doesn't adversely impact their tenancy in any way if they're tenants it doesn't interfere with the covenant of quiet enjoyment for the  folks in the spark home there's no impact between the the noble home and spark yet the city says we failed to prove this stuff and it's all in the record their pay there's an hour of daylight hours testimony and there's you know tons of evidence that that applies equally to the spark resident as it does to the neighbors so we'd argue that there was plenty of evidence that an accommodation was was the conditional permitted use is that he's all have different names for it but it's a you know a variance or a special use permit or in this case it's a conditional permitted use so we follow their procedure we say you know we submitted a petition the petition says give us the c p u or an accommodation we publish in the newspaper give us a c p u or an accommodation they posted a sign in the front of the house you know give us a we're going to have a zoning hearing this is what it's about at the hearing we presented evidence about the need for an accommodation down lauber testified i thought i was sworn in i testified for what that was worth and the city does not mention the accommodation in any of its in any of the proceedings limit which went on for hours and then it's you know it doesn't say a thing about the plainest request for accommodation at all during the zoning proceeding or during process the plaintiffs prove that it's necessary that they live there there are evidence of necessary is that they found this place and that's where they want to live it there is no evidence that it's impossible to find a house in in springfield that complies with the six hundred foot rule that's a simple matter of math and no one square mile area of of the land there would be a minimum of sixty four plots for homes that would be six hundred feet from the other the other platen springfield has  miles of of land so there's no that the argument that there could not be any other group home or location in springfield that it would be necessary for them to live there is simply not true but again  our week we go back to the legal definition of family and our position that if the language was meant to say five unrelated persons that's the easiest thing in the world to say and you wouldn't go through a convoluted manner to get to establish that that that's what it really really means the evidence from the one nine hundred ninety s of the legislative intent there was no evidence regarding the definition of family there was a lot of evidence that the only legislative intent was to plaintiffs prevail here that i ever i acknowledged in my initial argument and before the the ordinance is indefensible and will have to essentially confess judgment we've actually