Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-04-07126/USCOURTS-caDC-04-07126-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 443
Nature of Suit: Civil Rights Accommodations
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued January 12, 2006 Decided April 14, 2006

No. 04-7126

2922 SHERMAN AVENUE TENANTS’ ASSOCIATION, ET AL.,

APPELLEES/CROSS-APPELLANTS

v.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA,

APPELLANT/CROSS-APPELLEE

Consolidated with

04-7127, 04-7174, 04-7185, 04-7196

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 00cv00862)

James C. McKay, Jr., Senior Assistant Attorney General,

Office of Attorney General for the District of Columbia, argued

the cause for appellant/cross-appellee. With him on the briefs

were Robert J. Spagnoletti, Attorney General, and Edward E.

Schwab, Deputy Attorney General.

Philip M. Musolino was on the brief for cross-appellant

Andrew J. Serafin.

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Reed N. Colfax argued the cause for appellees/crossappellants. With him on the briefs were John P. Relman, Eliza

T. Platts-Mills, Bruce V. Spiva, and Hassan A. Zavareei. David

W. DeBruin and Denise L. Gilman entered appearances.

Jeffrey T. Green and Joseph R. Palmore were on the brief

for amici curiae National Fair Housing Alliance, et al. in support

of appellees/cross-appellants. Virginia A. Seitz entered an

appearance.

Before: TATEL, GARLAND, and GRIFFITH, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge TATEL.

TATEL, Circuit Judge: Charging that the District of

Columbia targeted Hispanic neighborhoods when it decided to

close certain apartment buildings for housing code violations,

several tenants’ groups brought both disparate treatment and

disparate impact discrimination claims against the city under the

Fair Housing Act (FHA) and D.C. Human Rights Act

(DCHRA). The district court allowed only the FHA disparate

impact claim to go to the jury, which then returned a verdict

favoring the tenants with regard to one building. The city now

appeals that verdict, while the tenants cross-appeal the district

court’s (1) order granting judgment as a matter of law to the city

on their FHA disparate treatment claim, and (2) refusal to

instruct the jury on their DCHRA claim. Because we agree with

the city that the tenants failed to demonstrate that its actions had

a disproportionate impact on Hispanics, we reverse and remand

with instructions to set aside the jury verdict and grant judgment

to the District on the FHA disparate impact claim. But because

the tenants offered sufficient evidence of intentional

discrimination to support their FHA disparate treatment claim,

and because the district court should have instructed the jury on

their DCHRA claim, we remand those claims for a new trial. 

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I.

Located just west of the border between northwest and

northeast Washington, D.C., Columbia Heights is, by all

accounts, a neighborhood in transition. A low-income and

disproportionately Hispanic community for many years,

Columbia Heights became the focus of multimillion dollar

redevelopment efforts after a metro station opened there in

September 1999. In April 2000, the tenants of several Columbia

Heights apartment buildings sued the District of Columbia in

U.S. District Court alleging that in attempting to gentrify the

neighborhood—an effort that culminated in the closing or

attempted closing of their buildings—the city violated federal

and local fair housing laws. Both the tenants and the District

filed cross-claims against the landlords. In April 2004, the

tenants’ claims regarding three buildings—1512 Park Road,

1458 Columbia Road, and 2922 Sherman Avenue—went to trial.

The following evidence was presented: 

In early 2000, District officials launched a program, known

as the “Hot Properties Initiative,” to enforce the housing code

aggressively in the city’s “worst” multi-family apartment

buildings. Supp. App. 24, 32-33. Administered by the District’s

Neighborhood Stabilization Program (NSP), the Initiative,

according to District witnesses, was intended to protect the

health and safety of building tenants. NSP officials began the

Initiative by directing District housing inspectors to identify

apartment buildings with the most dangerous and persistent

housing code violations. This effort produced a list of

approximately 75 buildings distributed evenly throughout the

city (with the exception of its wealthiest neighborhoods, Dupont

Circle, Georgetown, and upper Northwest). After “paring the

list down,” id. at 21, the NSP director passed it along to officials

at NSP’s overseeing agency, the Department of Consumer and

Regulatory Affairs (DCRA). DCRA officials then made

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additional alterations to the list, removing many buildings and

adding others. Soon after, NSP released a final “Hot Properties

List” identifying what it said were the city’s 27 worst buildings.

On average, these buildings were located in neighborhoods

where the percentage of Hispanic residents was 4.1 times the

percentage of Hispanics in the city as a whole. Not one city

witness was able to explain why the List concentrated so heavily

on Hispanic neighborhoods. 

After DCRA’s director informed NSP officials that he

wanted the Hot Properties buildings closed, NSP posted closure

notices at five buildings in and around Columbia Heights, where

the percentage of Hispanic residents was 4.4 times the

percentage of Hispanics in the city as whole. The tenants of

several buildings, including 2922 Sherman Avenue and 1458

Columbia Road, filed a motion for a temporary restraining

order. The District then postponed the closure dates and

eventually abandoned its efforts to close the buildings. 

Several months later, however, the District targeted another

Hot Properties building, 1512 Park Road, for closure. Although

almost a year earlier an inspector had reported electrical

problems and a missing fire escape at the Park Road building,

the District not only failed to make any effort to remedy these

code violations, but also gave the tenants just “a few minutes”

notice before evacuating the building. J.A. 159. The city

declined to provide any relocation assistance, leaving the tenants

homeless. 

The tenants also presented evidence that in closing 1512

Park Road and attempting to close 2922 Sherman Avenue and

1458 Columbia Road, the District strayed from its general

practice of considering alternatives to closure, such as (1) using

a specially designated fund, the “5-513 fund,” to abate the

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violations and (2) seeking civil penalties against or criminal

prosecution of the landlords. 

In their lawsuit, the tenants argued that the District’s

actions violated the Fair Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 3601-3631,

which prohibits discrimination in housing on the basis of

(among other things) race or national origin. See id. § 3604.

Although the tenants articulated two theories of discrimination,

disparate impact and disparate treatment—we shall say more

about the difference later—the district court concluded at the

close of the tenants’ case-in-chief that they had failed to provide

sufficient evidence to establish disparate treatment.

Accordingly, the district court granted judgment to the city on

that claim. The tenants also claimed that the city’s actions

amounted to “place of residence” discrimination in violation of

the D.C. Human Rights Act, D.C. Code § 2-1402.21(a). But the

district court, finding the DCHRA inapplicable to the form of

discrimination the tenants alleged, refused to instruct the jury

with respect to that claim. 

Thus allowed to consider only the tenants’ FHA disparate

impact claim, the jury found the District liable for closing 1512

Park Road, but not for posting closure notices at either 2922

Sherman Avenue or 1458 Columbia Road. After hearing

additional testimony regarding damages, the jury awarded a total

of $181,500 to twelve former Park Road occupants, only two of

whom were Hispanic. 

The District now appeals the 1512 Park Road verdict, while

the tenants cross-appeal the district court’s refusal to instruct the

jury on their DCHRA claim and its order granting judgment as

a matter of law to the city on their FHA disparate treatment

claim. The landlord of 1458 Columbia Road, Andrew Serafin,

also appeals, arguing that the district court erred in denying his

motion to dismiss the District’s cross-claim against him.

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II.

We begin with the tenants’ FHA claims. As relevant here,

the FHA makes it unlawful

(a) To . . . make unavailable or deny, a dwelling

to any person because of race, color, religion,

sex, familial status, or national origin.

(b) To discriminate against any person in the

terms, conditions, or privileges of sale or rental

of a dwelling, or in the provision of services or

facilities in connection therewith, because of

race, color, religion, sex, familial status or

national origin. 

42 U.S.C. § 3604(a)-(b). As noted above, the tenants rest their

FHA claim on two distinct theories. First, they argue that the

record reveals evidence of disparate treatment, i.e., that in

adopting the Hot Properties Initiative and selecting their

buildings for closure, the District intentionally discriminated

against Hispanics. Second, they argue that even if unable to

prove intentional discrimination, they can nonetheless prevail

because the Hot Properties Initiative had a disparate impact on

Hispanics. See Palmer v. Shultz, 815 F.2d 84, 90 (D.C. Cir.

1987) (describing the difference between disparate treatment

and disparate impact). 

Although the Supreme Court has barred constitutional

disparate impact claims, see Washington v. Davis, 426 U.S. 229

(1976), it has permitted such claims when brought pursuant to

federal law. In the seminal case on this issue, Griggs v. Duke

Power Co., 401 U.S. 424 (1971), the Supreme Court considered

whether, absent evidence of discriminatory intent, an

employment test that had a disproportionate impact on black

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workers could violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,

42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2, which bars employment discrimination

“because of . . . race . . . or national origin.” Answering yes, the

Court explained that Congress intended Title VII to prohibit, in

addition to intentional discrimination, certain practices having

an unintended discriminatory impact:

 The Act proscribes not only overt discrimination

but also practices that are fair in form, but

discriminatory in operation. The touchstone is

business necessity. If an employment practice

which operates to exclude Negroes cannot be

shown to be related to job performance, the

practice is prohibited.

Griggs, 401 U.S. at 431. In other words, to prove a disparate

impact claim in the employment context, a plaintiff must first

demonstrate that the challenged policy or practice has a

disproportionate effect on a protected class. If the plaintiff

makes this showing, the employer can prevail only by

demonstrating that its practice was consistent with business

necessity. See, e.g., Arnold v. U.S. Postal Serv., 863 F.2d 994,

996 (D.C. Cir. 1988); see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(k)(1)(A)-(C)

(expressly extending Title VII to disparate impact claims). 

The Supreme Court has yet to consider the availability of

disparate impact claims under the FHA. Significantly, however,

the FHA’s language prohibiting discrimination—“because of 

. . . race . . . or national origin”—is identical to Title VII’s, and

since Griggs, every one of the eleven circuits to have considered

the issue has held that the FHA similarly prohibits not only

intentional housing discrimination, but also housing actions

having a disparate impact. See John F. Stanton, The Fair

Housing Act and Insurance: An Update and the Question of

Disability Discrimination, 31 Hofstra L. Rev. 141, 174 n.180

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(2002) (listing cases). The tenants urge us to take the same

approach here. Expressing no view on the issue, the District

“assume[s] arguendo that a violation of the FHA may be found

based on evidence of disparate effect alone.” District’s Br. 33

n.5. Given that only one side of the issue has been briefed,

however, instead of simply adopting the approach of our

respected sister circuits, we think it more appropriate to assume

without deciding that the tenants may bring a disparate impact

claim under the FHA. 

Disparate Impact

Recall that the district court allowed the jury to hear the

tenants’ FHA disparate impact claim, and that the tenants

prevailed with respect to one building, 1512 Park Road. On

appeal, the District argues that the record contains insufficient

evidence of disparate impact and that the district court therefore

erred in denying its motion for judgment as a matter of law. As

always, we review de novo a trial court’s denial of judgment as

a matter of law, setting aside the jury’s verdict only if “the

evidence and all reasonable inferences that can be drawn

therefrom are so one-sided that reasonable men and women

could not disagree” that the verdict is in error. Duncan v. Wash.

Metro. Area Transit Auth., 240 F.3d 1110, 1113 (D.C. Cir.

2001) (internal quotation marks omitted). 

In one of the first cases to permit an FHA disparate impact

claim, Metropolitan Housing Development Corp. v. Village of

Arlington Heights, 558 F.2d 1283 (7th Cir. 1977), the Seventh

Circuit emphasized that not “every action which produces

discriminatory effects is illegal,” id. at 1290. The court

identified four factors for determining whether conduct that

produces a disparate impact violates the FHA: (1) the strength

of the plaintiff’s showing of discriminatory effect; (2) whether

any evidence indicates discriminatory intent; (3) the defendant’s

interest in taking the challenged action; and (4) whether the

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plaintiff seeks to compel the defendant to affirmatively provide

housing to a protected class or merely to restrain the defendant

from interfering with individual property owners who wish to

provide such housing. Id. 

Believing it would place “too onerous a burden” on

plaintiffs to treat these four factors “as steps necessary to make

out a prima facie case” of discriminatory effect, the Second

Circuit developed a burden-shifting framework: once the

plaintiff demonstrates the challenged practice has a

disproportionate impact, the burden shifts to the defendant to

“prove that its actions furthered, in theory and in practice, a

legitimate, bona fide governmental interest and that no

alternative would serve that interest with less discriminatory

effect.” Huntington Branch, NAACP v. Town of Huntington,

844 F.2d 926, 935-36 (2d Cir. 1988), aff’d on other grounds,

488 U.S. 15, 18 (1988). Several circuits have adopted this

burden-shifting framework. See, e.g., Darst-Webbe Tenant

Ass’n Bd. v. St. Louis Hous. Auth., 417 F.3d 898, 901-02 (8th

Cir. 2005); Langlois v. Abington Hous. Auth., 207 F.3d 43, 51

(1st Cir. 2000). 

In this case, the tenants emphasize the Second Circuit’s

framework, while the city relies primarily on the Seventh

Circuit’s four-factor inquiry. We need not adopt one approach

over the other, however, for under either approach the tenants’

claim fails. Both approaches require proof of disproportionate

impact, and as we explain below, the tenants produced no such

evidence. 

Pointing out that only two of the twelve tenants awarded

damages were Hispanic, the District argues that the tenants lose

as a matter of law because they failed to satisfy their burden of

establishing that the closing of 1512 Park Road had a

disproportionate impact on Hispanics. This argument misstates

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the tenants’ claim. As the district court explained, the policy the

tenants’ disparate impact claim challenges is not the closing of

1512 Park Road—hardly a policy, in any event—but the Hot

Properties Initiative, specifically the use of the Hot Properties

List to determine which buildings to close. See J.A. 106-07.

Under the tenants’ theory of the case, the closing of 1512 Park

Road is significant because it constitutes the injury they suffered

as a result of the Hot Properties Initiative. To analogize again

to the employment context, the city’s closing of 1512 Park Road

pursuant to the Hot Properties Initiative is similar to an

employer’s refusal to hire a single individual based on the

results of an allegedly discriminatory test. To prevail, such an

individual would need to show not that her failure to obtain the

job disproportionately affected her protected class (such an

inquiry would make little sense where the employer’s action

affected only one person), but rather that the test itself had a

disproportionate effect on the protected class. Here, then, the

question is whether the tenants satisfied their burden of

establishing that the 27 buildings listed as Hot Properties had a

disproportionate number of Hispanic residents.

In finding sufficient evidence of disparate impact, the

district court relied on the testimony of the tenants’ statistical

expert, who explained that the buildings on the Hot Properties

List were located, on average, in census block groups whose

percentage of Hispanic residents was 4.1 times the percentage

of Hispanics in the District as a whole. See id. at 104-06, 217-

27. Seeing “no bright line rule to guide courts (or juries, or

experts) in deciding whether plaintiffs’ evidence has shown a

significantly adverse or disproportionate impact,” the district

court held that the tenants had presented “enough analytical

information tending to show that the District’s policies had a

disproportionate impact on Hispanics” to allow the jury to

consider the question. Id. at 105-06 (internal quotation marks

and citation omitted). We disagree.

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To prevail on a disparate impact claim, a plaintiff must offer

sufficient evidence to support a finding that the challenged

policy actually disproportionately affected a protected class.

For example, in Allen v. Seidman, 881 F.2d 375 (7th Cir. 1989),

a post-Griggs employment discrimination case, the Seventh

Circuit held that plaintiffs satisfied this burden by demonstrating

that 84 percent of white candidates passed the challenged

employment test as compared to only 39 percent of black

candidates, see id. at 378-80. Likewise, in Huntington Branch,

where the Second Circuit allowed an FHA disparate impact

challenge to a town’s public housing policy to proceed to trial,

plaintiffs presented evidence that although only 5 percent of the

town’s population was minority, each of the town’s three

housing projects had between 30 and 95 percent minority

residents. See 844 F.2d at 929. 

In this case, by contrast, the tenants provided no evidence

that the specific buildings on the Hot Properties List were

disproportionately Hispanic. Instead, their statistical expert

merely described the ethnic composition of all District

neighborhoods, leaving it to the jury to infer the ethnic

composition of the buildings from the ethnic composition of

their respective neighborhoods. To be sure, under some

circumstances a reasonable jury could infer a building’s ethnic

composition from the ethnic composition of its neighborhood.

For example, if the city’s population was 5 percent Hispanic and

the neighborhood 95 percent Hispanic, one could reasonably

assume that each individual building in the neighborhood was

also disproportionately Hispanic. In this case, however, a

reasonable jury could make no such assumption because the

percentage of Hispanics in the relevant neighborhoods, while

disproportionate to the 7.9 percent found in the city as a whole,

averaged only 32.4 percent. See J.A. 224-27. Without evidence

that the Hispanic population was evenly distributed throughout

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the buildings in the tenants’ neighborhoods, a jury could not

reasonably assume that any particular building was

disproportionately Hispanic. Indeed, absent such evidence, it

seems just as likely that the neighborhood averages were high

because some buildings were heavily Hispanic while many

others were not.

Given this conclusion, we need not consider the District’s

argument that the tenants’ disparate impact claim fails for lack

of “evidence of a relevant comparison group—i.e., persons

unaffected by the policy who were not in the protected group

and who were similarly [situated].” District’s Br. 45. As we

have explained, absent evidence of the actual ethnic composition

of the buildings on the Hot Properties List, no jury could

reasonably conclude that the Initiative had a disproportionate

impact on Hispanics. Accordingly, the district court should

have granted the District’s motion for judgment as a matter of

law on the tenants’ disparate impact claim. 

Disparate Treatment

The next issue before us is whether the district court erred

in granting judgment to the city on the tenants’ FHA disparate

treatment claim. Reviewing the district court’s order de novo,

we affirm only if no reasonable jury could find in the tenants’

favor. See Sparshott v. Feld Entm’t, Inc., 311 F.3d 425, 429

(D.C. Cir. 2002). 

In contrast to disparate impact plaintiffs, plaintiffs alleging

disparate treatment must establish not that a facially neutral

policy disproportionately affected a protected class, but that the

defendant intentionally discriminated against them on the basis

of race or ethnicity. Accordingly, the specific question we face

here is whether the tenants offered sufficient evidence for a

reasonable jury to conclude that the District intentionally

targeted their buildings for closure because the buildings were

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located in disproportionately Hispanic neighborhoods.

Although we have no Circuit precedent addressing intentional

housing discrimination under the FHA, plaintiffs urge us to

follow the approach taken by many circuits and apply the

burden-shifting framework adopted by the Supreme Court in

McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 802-04

(1973), for use in employment discrimination cases. See, e.g.,

Sanghvi v. City of Claremont, 328 F.3d 532, 536-38 (9th Cir.

2003); Reg’l Econ. Cmty. Action Program, Inc. v. City of

Middletown, 294 F.3d 35, 48-52 (2d Cir. 2002); Kormoczy v.

HUD, 53 F.3d 821, 823-24 (7th Cir. 1995) (all applying

McDonnell Douglas to FHA claims). Under that framework,

plaintiffs must first present sufficient evidence to permit an

inference of discrimination. If they succeed, the burden then

shifts to the defendant to articulate a legitimate,

nondiscriminatory reason for its actions. If the defendant meets

that burden, plaintiffs may prevail by showing that the

defendant’s proffered reason was pretext for discrimination. See

McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 802-04. Because this approach

makes sense, and because the District does not urge otherwise,

we too shall apply the McDonnell Douglas framework. 

According to the tenants, the evidence presented at trial

suffices to (1) permit an inference that the District intentionally

discriminated against Hispanics in deciding which buildings to

close and (2) allow the jury to conclude that the District’s

asserted justification—protecting the health and safety of tenants

living in buildings with the worst housing code violations—was

pretext for discrimination. We agree. 

With regard to the initial inference of discrimination, record

evidence demonstrates that although the 75 buildings first

recommended for inclusion on the Hot Properties List were

evenly distributed throughout most of the city, the 27 buildings

ultimately placed on the List were located in neighborhoods

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with an average percentage of Hispanic residents 4.1 times as

great as the percentage of Hispanics in the city as a whole. The

five buildings posted for closure were located in even more

heavily Hispanic neighborhoods—neighborhoods having an

average Hispanic population 4.4 times the percentage of

Hispanics in the city.

The District insists that nothing in the record demonstrates

that most of the buildings initially listed but then excluded from

the final Hot Properties List were in non-Hispanic

neighborhoods. This is untrue. The tenants introduced maps

illustrating the percentage of Hispanic residents by census block

group for the entire city, the location of the 27 listed buildings,

and the location of the five properties placarded for closure. A

reasonable jury could rely on these maps, together with the

evidence that the 75 buildings were evenly distributed

throughout most of the city, see supra p. 3, to conclude that

although the initial list had not targeted Hispanic neighborhoods,

the final list did.

 

At trial, moreover, the District offered little explanation for

how or why city officials decided to (1) eliminate from the

initial list over fifty buildings recommended by the housing

inspectors, or (2) add several buildings which the inspectors

never identified as problem properties. As the tenants observe:

Not a single District official could explain the

sudden transformation of the list from one

including buildings from every quadrant in the

city, to a list almost exclusively comprised of

buildings in disproportionately Hispanic

neighborhoods. . . . The absence of objective

justification for the District’s subjective choices

. . . is strongly suggestive of an intent to

discriminate.

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Tenants’ Reply Br. 10.

At trial, District officials asserted that in listing the tenants’

buildings as Hot Properties and then targeting them for closure,

their intention was to protect the tenants’ health and safety. The

tenants, however, presented evidence that could lead a

reasonable jury to disbelieve this claim. To begin with, they

demonstrated that in deciding to close their buildings, the

District deviated from its usual practice of considering

alternative measures that would have protected the tenants while

causing less disruption, such as using 5-513 funds to abate the

violations or seeking civil penalties against the landlords.

According to record evidence, at the time the District targeted

the tenants’ buildings for closure, it was spending 5-513 funds

at an annual rate of between 1.3 and 1.5 million dollars.

Although housing inspectors testified that they repeatedly

recommended the use of such funds to abate violations at the

tenants’ buildings, record evidence indicates that city officials

refused to consider this option. When asked why, one official

explained that if the city had allocated 5-513 money to repairing

code violations at the tenants’ buildings, it would have

“jeopardize[d]” the availability of such funds for “other areas of

the city.” Supp. App. 59-60. In closing 1512 Park Road,

moreover, the District departed from its usual procedure of

providing relocation assistance when closing buildings, leaving

the tenants homeless with only a few minutes notice. 

Indeed, record evidence reveals instances in which city

officials treated buildings with serious code violations in nonHispanic neighborhoods differently than it treated the tenants’

buildings. One housing inspector testified about a set of

apartment buildings on Ayers Place, Southeast, where she

observed code violations involving smoke detectors, a defective

hot water system, and mold contamination. Rather than closing

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the entire complex, the District used roughly $40,000 of 5-513

funds to abate the violations. Another inspector described a

building on Ames Street, Southeast, which was not among the

buildings targeted for immediate closure even though it had

been included on the Hot Properties List and was, according to

the inspector, in “equally bad condition” when compared to

1458 Columbia Road. Id. at 57. The District asserts that the

tenants failed to demonstrate that the Ayers Place and Ames

Street buildings were located in non-Hispanic neighborhoods,

but the maps the tenants introduced at trial illustrate that every

census block in the city’s Southeast quadrant has a lower

percentage of Hispanic residents than the city as a whole. The

District also asserts that the violations at the Ayers Place and

Ames Street buildings were less serious than those at the

tenants’ buildings, particularly 1512 Park Road, which had

electrical problems and lacked an adequate fire escape. But

making such judgments is the jury’s responsibility, and

especially given the inspector’s testimony that the Ames Street

building was in “equally bad condition,” we think a reasonable

jury could find the violations at the Ayers Place and Ames Street

buildings sufficiently comparable to those at the tenants’

buildings to undermine the District’s claim of nondiscriminatory intent. See Gunning v. Cooley, 281 U.S. 90, 94

(1930) (explaining that it is for the jury to decide the “effect or

weight of evidence”). 

Taken together, the tenants’ evidence is more than enough

under McDonnell Douglas to have allowed the jury to hear the

disparate treatment claim. The relatively even distribution of

the 75 buildings initially recommended for inclusion on the Hot

Properties List, the District’s failure to explain how NSP and

DCRA officials selected the 27 buildings ultimately listed, and

the fact that those buildings were located in disproportionally

Hispanic neighborhoods all suffice to support an inference that

the District intentionally targeted Hispanic neighborhoods when

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it implemented the Hot Properties Initiative. See Vill. of

Arlington Heights v. Metro. Hous. Dev. Corp., 429 U.S. 252,

267 (1977) (noting that “[t]he historical background of the

decision” and “[t]he specific sequence of events leading up to

the challenged decision” may evidence intentional

discrimination). Moreover, based on the evidence that city

officials dealt with serious code violations differently in

Hispanic and non-Hispanic neighborhoods, a jury could

reasonably conclude that the District’s purported justification for

targeting the tenants’ buildings for closure—to protect the

tenants’ health and safety—was pretext for discrimination. See,

e.g., Graham v. Long Island R.R., 230 F.3d 34, 43 (2d Cir. 2000)

(explaining that a showing of differential treatment can “serve

as evidence that the [defendant’s] proffered legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for the adverse . . . action was a pretext

for racial discrimination”). In reaching this conclusion, we

emphasize that we are not saying that the District actually

discriminated against Hispanic tenants, but only that the record

contains sufficient evidence to allow a jury to make that

determination. 

Our earlier finding that the tenants produced insufficient

evidence to support their disparate impact claim, see supra pp.

8-12, in no way undermines our conclusion that the disparate

treatment claim should go to a jury. As noted above, the two

theories are distinct. Because a disparate impact claim requires

no evidence of discriminatory intent, we require plaintiffs to

establish that the challenged policy actually had a disparate

impact. In disparate treatment cases, by contrast, we focus on

the defendant’s motivation, not the effects of its actions. This

case nicely illustrates the difference. The fact that the tenants’

buildings are located in disproportionately Hispanic

neighborhoods could certainly motivate someone bent on

discriminating against Hispanics to close the buildings. Their

location alone could therefore give rise to an inference of

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discriminatory intent, even though it cannot support a

conclusion that the Hot Properties Initiative in fact had a

disparate impact on Hispanics.

The District makes several additional arguments, only one

of which requires further comment. Explaining that in contrast

to 1512 Park Road, it never actually closed the buildings at 2922

Sherman Avenue and 1458 Columbia Road, but merely

“placarded” them, the District argues that no discrimination

could have occurred with regard to those two buildings. This is

incorrect. The FHA prohibits making housing “unavailable” on

the basis of national origin. Although the District never forcibly

removed the tenants of 2922 Sherman Avenue and 1458

Columbia Road from their apartments, it did post closure notices

on both buildings for the purpose of, according to one city

witness, “get[ting] the tenants to leave.” Trial Tr. 221, Apr. 13,

2005. The notice posted at 1458 Columbia Road stated that “by

order of the housing regulation administration this structure is

declared unfit for human habitation and its occupancy and/or use

is hereby prohibited.” J.A. 417. The Sherman Avenue tenants

received a similar notice warning that their building was “unfit

for human habitation” and advising them “to seek alternative

housing accommodations.” Id. at 409. Telling the tenants either

that their “occupancy . . . is . . . prohibited” or that they must

“seek alternative housing” certainly qualifies as making the

buildings “unavailable” under the FHA. 

For all these reasons, we shall reverse the district court’s

grant of judgment as a matter of law to the city on the tenants’

disparate treatment claim and remand for trial.

III.

In addition to their FHA claims, the tenants charge the

District with “place of residence” discrimination in violation of

the D.C. Human Rights Act. See D.C. Code § 2-1402.21(a).

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The DCHRA makes it unlawful “to refuse or restrict facilities,

services, repairs or improvements for a tenant or lessee” “wholly

or partially for a discriminatory reason based on . . . race, color,

. . . or place of residence.” Id. A separate provision states that

“[a]ny practice which has the effect or consequence of violating

any of the provisions of this chapter shall be deemed to be an

unlawful discriminatory practice.” § 2-1402.68. The D.C.

Court of Appeals has held that this “effects clause” imports into

the Act “the concept of disparate impact discrimination

developed by the Supreme Court in Griggs v. Duke Power Co.”

Gay Rights Coal. v. Georgetown Univ., 536 A.2d 1, 29 (D.C.

1987). 

The district court refused to instruct the jury on the tenants’

DCHRA claim, explaining that: (1) the Act does not apply to the

form of housing discrimination challenged by the tenants, (2) an

exception to the Act bars the tenants’ claims, and (3) even if the

Act applies, it is “functionally indistinguishable” from the FHA,

making a separate instruction unnecessary. See J.A. 384-85.

The tenants challenge all three rulings. We review de novo a

district court’s refusal to instruct the jury. See Joy v. Bell

Helicopter Textron, Inc., 999 F.2d 549, 556 (D.C. Cir. 1993)

(“An alleged failure to submit a proper jury instruction is a

question of law subject to de novo review . . . .”).

We start with the tenants’ challenge to the district court’s

ruling that the DCHRA does not “apply by its terms” to the form

of housing discrimination they allege. Explaining that the Act

prohibits “refus[ing] or restrict[ing] facilities, services, repairs

or improvements for a tenant or lessee” based on her place of

residence, see D.C. Code § 2-1402.21(a)(4), the tenants assert

that enforcing the housing code is a “service” provided by the

District, and that “[t]he District’s differential provision of those

services to tenants in the Columbia Heights/Mount Pleasant area

. . . falls within the ambit of acts that refuse or restrict services

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contemplated by the [DCHRA],” Tenants’ Br. 47. The District

responds that the tenants’ argument “is based on a reading of an

isolated provision of the statute taken out of context.” District’s

Reply Br. 47. Pointing to several DCHRA provisions that focus

on “real property” transactions, the District asserts that the D.C.

Council intended the phrase “to refuse or restrict . . . services”

to apply not to the District of Columbia government, but only to

actions of property owners, landlords, and lenders. 

The tenants have the better argument. The relevant

provision, subsection 2-1402.21(a)(4), makes no reference to

“property owners, landlords, and lenders,” and we see no reason

to think that the presence of the phrase “real property” elsewhere

in section 2-1402.21 has any bearing on subsection 2-

1402.21(a)(4)’s application in this case. To the contrary, the

D.C. Court of Appeals has squarely held that subsection 2-

1402.21(a)(4) applies to actions by District agencies, including

actions not specifically mentioned in the Act’s definition of

“real estate transactions.” See George Washington Univ. v. D.C.

Bd. of Zoning Adjustment, 831 A.2d 921, 939-40 (D.C. 2003).

The District relies on Hessey v. Burden, 615 A.2d 562 (D.C.

1992), which found the DCHRA inapplicable to an initiative

involving tax assessment procedures, id. at 579-80. As the

tenants point out, however, in sharp contrast to the housing code

enforcement decisions at issue here, the tax procedures

challenged in Hessey bore no relationship at all to housing

discrimination.

The tenants next challenge the district court’s ruling that

their claim is precluded by one of the DCHRA’s exceptions,

which states that “[n]othing contained in the provisions of this

chapter shall be deemed to permit any rental or occupancy

otherwise prohibited by any statute, or by any regulation

previously enacted and not repealed herein.” D.C. Code § 2-

1402.24(b). The district court presumably found this exception

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applicable because the housing and fire codes are regulations

that allegedly prohibit “occupancy” of the tenants’ apartment

buildings. But none of the relief the tenants requested involved

continued occupancy in buildings deemed uninhabitable by the

District. The complaint and trial record make clear that the

tenants never sought to live in buildings with code violations;

instead, they wanted the District to remedy the violations either

by using 5-513 funds or by pursuing the buildings’ owners.

Finally, the tenants challenge the district court’s conclusion

that a separate DCHRA instruction was unnecessary because

their DCHRA claim was “indistinguishable” from their Fair

Housing Act claim. As the tenants point out, the DCHRA

prohibits “place of residence” discrimination, see D.C. Code §

2-1402.21(a), which, in contrast to national origin

discrimination, requires no evidence regarding the Hispanic

population of the tenants’ buildings. Defending the district

court’s conclusion, the city argues that because “the thrust of

[the tenants’] complaint is that the District’s enforcement

actions were concentrated [in disproportionately Hispanic

neighborhoods],” their place of residence claims are “completely

dependent” on their national origin claims. District’s Reply Br.

50. Again, the tenants have the better argument. A reasonable

jury could conclude that even if the tenants provided insufficient

evidence of national origin discrimination, they demonstrated

that the District targeted buildings in Columbia Heights, thus

discriminating against the tenants based on their place of

residence. The tenants’ DCHRA and FHA claims are thus

sufficiently distinct to require separate instructions. 

IV.

This brings us finally to the cross-appeal of Andrew Serafin,

owner of 1458 Columbia Road at the time of the challenged

actions. Although the tenants initially named Serafin as a

defendant, they later voluntarily dismissed their claims against

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him. The District cross-claimed against Serafin and the other

building owners, asserting that if the tenants prevailed against

the District, the city was “entitled to judgment and/or

contribution” from the building owners because “their failure to

abate the housing code violations caused the District to take

enforcement action that may have led to Plaintiffs’ alleged

damages.” District’s Answer to Second Am. Compl. 11. The

district court denied Serafin’s motion to dismiss the District’s

cross-claim, but agreed to sever it from the rest of the case. 

Although Serafin’s brief is far from clear, he seems to argue

that in ruling on his “Motion to Strike or Dismiss Crossclaim of

District of Columbia,” Serafin’s Br. 1, the district court erred in

declining to dismiss not only the District’s claim against him,

but also the claims of the 1458 Columbia Road tenants against

the District. Serafin explains that in 2002 he entered into an

agreement of sale with the Tenants Association of 1458

Columbia Road which required the Association to “cause to be

dismissed with prejudice all civil actions and all regulatory

proceedings against . . . Serafin.” Id. at 3-4. Accordingly, he

asserts, “the Columbia Road Association was obligated to

release its claims against the District . . . in order to effect the

release or the dismissal of the District[’s] . . . crossclaim against

Serafin.” Id. at 4. From this, Serafin concludes that the district

court should have dismissed the 1458 Columbia Road tenants’

claims against the District, thereby mooting the District’s claims

against him. 

Though Serafin’s claim suffers from defects too numerous

to recount here, we think it appropriate to give him precisely

what he wants: de novo review of the district court’s

“construction of [the] contract provision.” Id. at 5; see LTV

Corp. v. Gulf States Steel, Inc., 969 F.3d 1050, 1055 (D.C. Cir.

1992) (“Interpretation of the plain language of a contract is a

question of law subject to de novo review by this court.”).

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Contrary to Serafin’s assertions, we see not a word in the

contract that precludes either the tenants’ claims against the

District or the District’s cross-claim against Serafin. The

contract requires nothing more than that the Columbia Road

tenants dismiss their claims against Serafin, which they did.

V.

To sum up, although the tenants have failed to demonstrate

that the Hot Properties Initiative had a disparate impact on

Hispanics, they have presented sufficient evidence for a

reasonable jury to conclude that the District (1) intentionally

discriminated against them on the basis of national origin in

violation of the FHA, and (2) discriminated against them on the

basis of place of residence in violation of the DCHRA. We thus

reverse and remand with instructions to the district court to grant

judgment to the District on the tenants’ FHA disparate impact

claim and to conduct a new trial limited to the tenants’ FHA

disparate treatment and DCHRA “place of residence”

discrimination claims. We affirm the district court’s denial of

Serafin’s motion to dismiss.

 So ordered. 

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