Yonkers Housing Desegregation Case Nears End

YONKERS-City officials and members of the NAACP held a press conference last week at City Hall to announce they had reached a settlement agreement that could end a contentious federal housing desegregation case that has divided the city and curtailed real estate investment in Yonkers for nearly three decades. Yonkers Mayor Philip Amicone, members of the Yonkers City Council and representatives from the NAACP and other civic and community leaders were on hand at the event to sign the settlement agreement, which states that the City of Yonkers has met all of its obligations under the federal housing desegregation order.

Twenty-seven years ago the US government filed suit against the City of Yonkers charging the city had engaged in discriminatory housing and school policies. The NAACP joined the case as a plaintiff shortly thereafter. With the agreement in hand, the end of the case could come on May 1 when US District Court Judge Leonard Sand holds a hearing on the proposed settlement at federal court in Manhattan. Judge Sand has overseen the desegregation cases and has imposed court orders regarding the construction of affordable housing in Yonkers as well as change to school policies. The school desegregation case was settled in 2002.

City officials say that the agreement between the city and the NAACP was possible due to the completion of a court-ordered stock of 600 affordable housing units that were constructed throughout the city, with the exception in Southwest Yonkers.

Commenting on the agreement, Yonkers Mayor Amicone said, "Together, we have made much progress. In a moment, I will sign an agreement indicating that the City of Yonkers has met all of its obligations under the federal court order. The significance of this moment is impossible to understate. United States versus the City of Yonkers and the ensuing federal court order that we end today defined an entire generation in Yonkers. The federal desegregation case, as it came to be known, affected every family and neighborhood in this city. No man, woman or child, for better or worse, was spared its effects. Though each of us was touched separately, we learned much as a city."

Part of the agreement mandates that the city continue to follow its Affordable Housing Ordinance that calls for new multifamily construction in most districts in the city to set aside 20% of the units as affordable.

Karen Edmonson, president of the Yonkers chapter of the NAACP, says she is pleased that the case appears to be coming to an end, although she notes the NAACP and the federal government will continue to monitor the city's adherence to the settlement agreement for years to come.

While she is pleased with the integration that has taken place in the city since the lawsuit was filed, Edmonson says, "My concern is that if the NAACP is not vigilant in monitoring the order, ultimately minority people will be segregated, not by race, but by economics not only in Yonkers, but throughout Westchester County."