Response to Affirmative Action Court Decision:
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Stay Connected with the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights |
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Thursday, July 6, 2023
Free Civil Rights & Employment Training:
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Stay Connected with the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights |
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Wednesday, July 5, 2023
Mental Health Legislation Introduced to Increase Community-Based Services
Innovative Mental Health Legislation would Increase Community-Based Services for Adults with Mental Health Disabilities
At the Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law’s June 22, 2023 event celebrating the 24th anniversary of the decision in Olmstead v. L.C. (Lois Curtis), it was announced that New York’s Senator Kirsten Gillibrand and Congressman Daniel Goldman (D-NY-10) have proposed the “Strengthening Medicaid for Serious Mental Illness Act.” Read the press release here.
The Act would provide desperately needed mental health support to the 14 million adults in the U.S. living with a serious mental illness (SMI), such as schizophrenia, bipolar illness, and major depressive disorder. Too many individuals living with SMI are stuck in a devastating cycle moving between hospitals, jails, and housing instability due to lack of access to community-based treatment. In 2021, over 1/3 of individuals with SMI did not receive any form of mental health treatment. In New York City, a number of subway deaths have highlighted the need for access to intense and immediate mental health support. This bill creates a new package of services under Medicaid targeted specifically to individuals living with SMI, sets a national standard for SMI care, and incentivizes states to provide intensive community-based services to treat SMI.
The Bazelon Center helped shape this legislation and strongly supports the “Strengthening Medicaid for Serious Mental Illness Act,” a critical improvement to the Medicaid program. It also has been endorsed by the National Health Law Program. The legislation, introduced on the 24th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Olmstead v. L.C. (Lois Curtis), will incentivize states to provide a robust array of intensive community-based services for adults with mental health disabilities. These services - including Assertive Community Treatment (ACT), housing-related services, supported employment, peer support services, and mobile crisis services - have been proven to help individuals with disabilities live successfully in their own homes and communities. The services help people avoid unnecessary institutionalization in hospitals and other facilities, which under Olmstead constitutes disability-based discrimination. This bill will help states comply with their legal obligations and save taxpayer dollars that would otherwise pay for expensive institutional care.
These services – including housing-related services, supported employment, peer support services, ACT, and mobile crisis services–have been proven to help individuals with disabilities live successfully in their own homes and communities and avoid unnecessary institutionalization in hospitals and other facilities, which under Olmstead v. L.C. constitutes disability-based discrimination.
Specifically, the Strengthening Medicaid for Serious Mental Illness Act would:
1. Create a new waiver program granting Medicaid authority to provide states with an option to offer a package of services targeted specifically to individuals with SMI. The package would include:
- Assertive community treatment, an evidence-based, highly individualized team-based service designed to support adults with the most intensive mental health needs;
- Supported employment to help individuals get and keep a job;
- Peer support services from individuals who have lived or living experiences with mental health conditions;
- Mobile crisis intervention teams that can help de-escalate situations and link individuals to other community-based services;
- Intensive case management; and
- Housing-related activities and services to support individuals with transitioning to and maintaining housing.
2. Require states to adhere to certain standards, like tracking disparities in treatment, to ensure services are delivered with care to all in need.
3. Create a tiered Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (FMAP) increase to incentivize states to provide intensive community-based services to individuals with SMI. This means that states could receive an increase up to 25% in funds allocated by the federal government for their Medicaid programs.
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June 2023 Monthly Briefing, Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law, 2023.
Read the June 22, 2023 Press Release.
Read the June 22, 2023 NHeLP release.
Monday, July 3, 2023
Book Review:
Into the Bright Sunshine: Young Hubert Humphrey and the Fight for Civil Rights
by Samuel G. Freedman
Oxford University Press: 2023. 504 pages. $34.95.
This interesting book celebrates the Democratic Party's 1948 adoption of a Civil Rights plank at its presidential nominating convention. Hubert Humphrey was the driving force behind this important landmark in the Civil Rights movement. As Adam Hochschild, author of Bury the Chains (2005) and American Midnight (2022), commented: "...Even people like me who disagreed with Hubert Humphrey over Vietnam will come away from this book with a deepened respect for the man who dragged his reluctant party to take a stand for civil rights."
When they convened in 1948, a pressing issue - besides re-nominating Harry Truman for President - was if Democrats would finally embrace the cause of civil rights and put it in their official platform. Even under Franklin Roosevelt, the party had dodged the issue in order to keep a bloc of Southern segregationists - the so-called Dixiecrats-in the New Deal coalition. On the convention's final day, Hubert Humphrey, then 37 and the not well known mayor of Minneapolis, urged the delegates to "get out of the shadow of state's rights and walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights." To many's surprise including Humphrey, the delegates voted to adopt a strong civil-rights plank. Truman ran on it in his campaign, desegregated the armed forces, and upset the Republican frontrunner Thomas Dewey - a victory due in part to an unprecedented surge of Black voters.
The book includes the history of Humphrey's many contributions to liberal politics, especially regarding civil rights. Humphrey's life journey to the 1948 pivotal speech went from a rural, all-white South Dakota town, to the mayoralty of Minneapolis where he fought its notorious racism and anti-Semitism, to his role as a national champion of multiracial democracy. His allies included a Black newspaper publisher, a Jewish attorney, and a professor who had fled Nazi Germany. The adversaries were the white supremacists, Christian Nationalists, and America Firsters of mid-century America - one of whom tried to assassinate him on February 6, 1947. The March 18, 1948 Minneapolis Star Tribune explained that Humphrey’s championship of civil rights and work for honesty in government "had stoked anger in some quarters."
Highly Recommended.
*****
Sources:
New Housing Data Available for Maryland:
MORE EVICTION DATA AVAILABLE FOR STATE OF MARYLAND
Maryland released a new dashboard of Eviction Data in May 2023. This is in response to a 2022 Maryland General Assembly law requiring the District Court of Maryland to collect and report eviction case data and requiring the Department of Housing and Community Development to publish a dashboard for public viewing and analysis and to publish an annual eviction report. The District Court began collecting the eviction case data required under the law on January 1, 2023, and the public dashboard launched in May 2023.
Contents of the Dashboard -
The dashboard contains multiple pages with: (1) Statewide Eviction Summary, and (2) Eviction Data by Case Type. DHCD is developing new features for the dashboard that will offer additional analysis tools, including mapping and summary data for all landlord-tenant cases.
Court Data Collection Process -
- Sheriff's offices collect a few basic data points on the evictions they conduct. Each sheriff uses a different tool or process to track this data.
- Data is provided by the sheriff's office monthly to the District Court clerk's office on the evictions they conducted.
- The District Court clerks enter the data into the Maryland Electronic Court (MDEC) data system.
- Judiciary staff compile data using the MDEC monthly.
Eviction Data Not Included -
Not all evictions conducted in January through March 2023 may be reflected in the data as of publishing, as the new data collection and reporting process is continuing to be implemented and refined. The data provided by the District Courts for this dashboard only includes cases where the tenant was forcibly evicted by the sheriff’s office under a legal warrant of restitution. Court data does not include all judgments of possession, which deemed the tenant no longer had a right to the property. Additionally, court data does not include all tenants with orders of warrants of restitution.
On average, there are typically between 10,000-12,000 warrants of restitution ordered in a month. Of those, there are approximately 1,000-2,000 evictions conducted by the sheriff, which is the data included in this dashboard. As a result, this dashboard does not include:
- Cases where a tenant moved out prior to a warrant of restitution being ordered by the court or moved out prior to the sheriff conducting an eviction
- Cases where a warrant of restitution was ordered but the tenant legally “paid to stay” under right of redemption
- Cases where a tenant was illegally evicted through lockout, turnoff of utilities, or other measures intended to force a tenant to leave the unit prior to the sheriff conducting an eviction
Dashboard viewers should not compare year-over-year trends for evictions using this dashboard, as the District Court did not begin collecting and reporting eviction case data until January 2023.
Eviction Case Types -
- Tenant Holding Over - A landlord files this when they allege the tenant refuses to leave the property after the lease term has expired. The landlord can use this to seek eviction and possibly monetary damages for rent owed.
- Breach of Lease - A landlord files this when they believe the tenant has violated the lease. The landlord can use this action to seek eviction.
- Failure to Pay Rent - A landlord files this when they believe the tenant owes back rent. The landlord can use this to seek eviction and possibly monetary damages for rent owed.
- Wrongful Detainer - A property owner or other lawful occupant uses this action to seek eviction when someone who is not a lawful occupant of the property refuses to leave.
*****
Sources:
Saturday, July 1, 2023
Celebration of ADA's 33rd Anniversary
MARYLAND CELEBRATES ADA'S 33RD ANNIVERSARY WITH TOWN HALL
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Friday, June 23, 2023
Update on Previous Whitepaper:
Maryland Needs a State CRA Law to Increase Racial Equity & Reinvestment
The following is a summary of a whitepaper by Josh Silver of the National Community Reinvestment Corporation (NCRC) entitled "A Maryland CRA Law Would Marshall Considerable Resources for Increasing Racial Equity and Reinvestment." In this article, Silver presents reasons why Maryland should adopt its own state Community Reinvestment Act (CRA). This article was referenced in the June 23, 2023 NCRC Just News. Download the whitepaper.
Economic Action Maryland has released a Policy Brief that advocated a Maryland CRA Law. Economic Action Maryland, the NCRC, and other housing advocates plan to push for the legislature to pass a bill in the 2024 Session. Del. Melissa Wells (D-Baltimore City) introduced legislation this year to propose a state-level community reinvestment act, but withdrew it.
The Major Points of the Whitepaper & Policy Brief
(1) A Maryland CRA law would apply to banks and credit unions with about $46 billion in assets. It would cover mortgage companies that made more than 68,000 loans in three years. The assets and lending activity are considerable resources that should have a CRA obligation for reinvesting in underserved neighborhoods.
(2) A state CRA law would help narrow racial and equity gaps in lending. In Baltimore, for example, 33% of recent loans went to African Americans whereas they constituted 62% of the population.
(3) State law can plug gaps in the federal law. The federal CRA applies to banks, whereas other state laws in Massachusetts and Illinois also apply to mortgage companies and credit unions.
Impact of a Maryland CRA Law
A state CRA law would apply CRA to institutions with tens of billions of dollars which offer tens of thousands of loans. State-chartered banks have about $38 billion in assets and state-chartered credit unions have nearly $8 billion in assets. The top ten independent mortgage companies issued almost 68,000 home purchase loans in Maryland during 2018-2020.
Applying CRA to institutions with these large resources would channel significant increases in loans and investments to neglected communities in Maryland. A state CRA law is needed to address sizable racial and income disparities in access to loans. In all of Maryland, lenders made 20% of their single-family loans to African Americans in 2018-2020 while 29% of the population was African American. The gap is even wider in Baltimore, which is 62% Black but where only 33% of loans went to African American borrowers.
While some gaps have narrowed slightly, underserved communities continue to suffer. For the whole state, lending institutions made 32% of their loans to low- and moderate-income (LMI) borrowers during 2018-2020 while 31.6% of the population was LMI. A significant disparity is in Baltimore where LMI borrowers received 58% of the loans but were 73% of the residents.
A state law would complement rather than duplicate federal law, as the experience of other state CRA laws have demonstrated. It can address needs and neighborhoods not explicitly addressed by the federal CRA. A state law could authorize Maryland’s Commissioner of Financial Regulation to conduct separate exams for individual counties. This would enable examiners to assess performance more rigorously in Baltimore and underserved rural counties. In contrast, federal CRA exams usually rate performance on a metropolitan level that hides poor performance, which most often occurs in the underserved counties. In addition, a CRA law could require the examiners to assess the sustainability of lending by considering default and delinquency rates. This is very important for underserved communities and is frequently overlooked by federal CRA exams.
A Maryland state law could contain provisions designed to counter CRA ratings inflation and that would motivate improvements in performance to communities of color. On a federal level, the pass rate of banks on their CRA exams is 98%. A state law should counter this inflation by introducing a fifth rating and by requiring examination of performance in underserved neighborhoods, which are disproportionately communities of color. By law, banks that fail their exams cannot receive deposits from a state agency. The Commissioner could also adjust fees based on ratings received.
Studies have shown that the federal CRA has increased lending and banking services in modest income communities. A state CRA law would expand and widen this. The gains in wealth from a rigorously enforced CRA, driven by homeownership and small business ownership, would benefit Maryland through higher gross domestic output, higher tax revenues, and reduced dependence on the state safety net.
Sources:
Read the June 13, 2023 NCRC article.
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