California Realtors apologize for role in racist housing

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The California Association of Realtors is apologizing for its role in pushing policies that drove racial segregation in the state, decades after the group put its money behind a proposition that overturned the state’s first fair housing law.

During a press conference Friday, leaders of multiple real estate organizations spoke about their next steps, following the association’s apology last week. The realtors’ group is now backing a bill that would overturn a law that makes it harder for the state to build affordable housing. The group is partnering with nonprofits focused on expanding homeownership among communities of color. It also pushed for a law requiring implicit bias training for real estate agents.

“This has been a very long time coming,” said Derrick Luckett, chairman of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers. The association has expressed a commitment to expanding intergenerational wealth among Black households.

The California Association of Realtors was one of many real estate groups that supported redlining, barriers to affordable housing projects, and other practices of the 20th century that led to more segregated cities across the United States.

During the 1930s, the Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, backed by the federal government, created maps that categorized parts of cities into grades based on their purported creditworthiness. The practice, now known as redlining, drove racial segregation and income inequality by preventing residents living in certain neighborhoods from receiving loans.

The California Association of Realtors, then known as the California Real Estate Association, paid for a campaign to add an amendment to the state constitution in 1950 forcing the government to get voter approval before spending public money on affordable housing. In more recent decades, the group has supported repealing the amendment.

In 1964, the association put its money behind a proposition to invalidate the Rumford Act, a law aimed at protecting people of color from discrimination while they were searching for a home.

In 2020, following the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, which led to global demonstrations against racism and police violence, the National Association of Realtors apologized for its role in housing discrimination. Real estate groups in cities including St. Louis and Minneapolis have recently followed suit.

Otto Catrina, president of the California Association…