Maintenance Personnel and Fair Housing

It’s important to remember how important our maintenance staff is when it comes to Fair Housing.  It’s easy for them to fall into traps when dealing with residents.

A couple of examples may help you deal with this issue.  How would you handle these situations?

A.   A resident speaks to a maintenance person about hanging a ceiling fan. The maintenance person tells the resident to please place a work order with the office, and states that he/she has installed fans for other residents and it isn’t that difficult. The resident calls the office to request that the fan be connected and is told that it is not a routine request and that it will cost the resident to have the fan installed. The resident is angry and feels that s/he is being treated differently from other residents who had their work done by maintenance.

Suggestion:  It is important not to reveal, to any resident, work that has been done for another tenant, because it becomes a source of comparison. Any work request should come from the office and should not be discussed at any time with another resident. The best response would have been. “Please place an work order with the office.”

B.  A maintenance employee does not like a resident and tries to avoid doing work orders for this person. The resident files a complaint against the community because she alleges that her requests for maintenance are being ignored because of her ethnicity.

Suggestion:   Every resident deserves the right to have repair requests completed, whether an employee likes the resident or not.  It is our job to take care of maintenance requests. If there is a communication or personality problem it might be best to have two people handle the request.  Employees should take great care in how they address residents and how they look at them. A stern look or a look of exasperation could cause complaints.

C.   A maintenance employee, whose first language is Spanish, speaks more frequently to residents in his native language in the presence of another resident who does not speak the language. Some of the conversations are lively and the other resident feels they are talking about him and ignoring him in the conversation. The resident files a complaint with the office that he is being discriminated against because of the nature of the conversation.

Suggestion:  All people have the right to speak their native language. However when others perceived that they  are being criticized or excluded, it could result in a complaint.  It is important to treat all residents the same way. Talk with your personnel about possible misperceptions, and ask them to help you avoid these situations,  especially in public areas.

These scenarios may not be a violation of the Fair Housing Act.  However, they could have been handled in a better way. It is important to share with your maintenance staff the importance of the Fair Housing Laws and to help them to be aware of ways they can be careful in how they handle situations. They need to understand that they too are part of “management” to the residents, and that their actions could cause Fair Housing Complaints.