Cohousing-L Mailing List: RE: Screeing Backgrounds of New People

[M Donovan (events]

Actually Rob, I believe you CAN legally stop a felon, child abuser,
republican conservative, or a Hajjied (?) from buying a condo unit for
sale. You can also stop a school teacher, a vegetarian, a Libertarian, a
Unitarian. Descrimination is illegal on very narrow grounds: race, creed,
color, national origin, and in some locations marital status, child status,
and sexual orientation. Not that I recommend it. One legal case involved a
lawyer that was refused a unit at an apartment complex. Filed suit based on
discrimination. Which the court acknowledged. However, it was not ILLEGAL
discrimination. Big difference. Lost suit.

Now a group may well wonder whether they want to spend their HOA fees on
lawyers (whether you allow them to buy a unit or not ;-). Anyone can sue,
and many are overly inclined to. And I agree with those that pointed out
that screening people gives a false sense of security. Its easier to watch
someone next door than the felon, child abuser, republican down the street.

Michael Donovan
Village in the City
St. Louis MO

>I do not beleive you can legally  stop a felon, a child abuser, a republican
>conservative, or a Hajjied from buying any condo unit for sale. Should you
>attempt to do so, you can end up on the bad end of a discrimation lawsuit.
>Of course you can snoop on people if you want. The web makes this pretty
>easy I understand. For a small fee you can check for crimminal records in
>all 50 states, although the records only go back 3 years in most states.
>
>
>Rob Sandelin
>Northwest Intentional Communties Association
>Building a better society, one neighborhood at a time