Feds sue Joliet over efforts against Evergreen Terrace
Chicago Sun-Times From Staff Reports August 4, 2011 5:28PM

CHICAGO — The city of Joliet, which has been battling to remove the Evergreen Terrace housing complex since 2005, now is being sued by the federal government.

On Thursday, the United States filed a civil lawsuit against the city in federal court in Chicago.

The lawsuit alleges that Joliet violated federal housing laws by moving to condemn and take through eminent domain the federally subsidized housing development.

The suit was announced by the U.S. attorney’s office and the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

City officials contend the complex attracts crime and provides substandard housing. At the time, the private owners claimed the city was seeking to get rid of low-income housing.

Joliet’s action, the federal lawsuit claims, would displace from their homes approximately 764 low-income residents, most of whom are African-American, and would require most of these residents to leave Joliet because of the lack of sufficient affordable housing in the city.

The government is seeking a court order prohibiting the alleged housing discrimination, unspecified monetary damages for those harmed by the city’s actions and a civil penalty.

The lawsuit states that the effect of the city’s actions and proposed actions is “to limit or reduce the number of black or African-American residents residing within the city of Joliet.”

“The city of Joliet continues to try to condemn Evergreen Terrace while neglecting to propose any realistic plan for relocating its residents within the city, making it necessary for the federal government to take steps to protect the housing rights of these residents,” said Patrick Fitzgerald, U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois.

Mostly African-American

Evergreen Terrace is a 356-unit apartment complex consisting of eight buildings on North Broadway and North Bluff streets on the west side of the Des Plaines River.

According to the complaint, 731 of 764 residents, or 95.6 percent, are African-American. Overall, 16 percent of Joliet’s 147,433 residents identified themselves as black or African-American in the 2010 census.

The complaint alleges that Joliet violated the Fair Housing Act when it acted to condemn the Evergreen Terrace complex. Rents at Evergreen Terrace are subsidized by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development under the Section 8 program.

Joliet: HUD nixed options

Tom Thanas, Joliet’s city manager, agreed the residents of Evergreen Terrace deserve quality living conditions.

“But we disagree with HUD’s conclusion that the city of Joliet is unable to provide those conditions,” Thanas said, “and that’s why we’ve been pursuing a condemnation lawsuit against the property for several years.”

That process will continue, Thanas said, but the city welcomes third-party scrutiny of the case. He said Joliet offered HUD some “options” before it filed its lawsuit, but the federal agency clearly wasn’t satisfied.

The lawsuit could take a long time to resolve, Thanas said, and it’ll likely mean a big legal bill for the cash-strapped city.

“That’s what makes the lawsuit even that more unfortunate,” Thanas said.

In March of 2009, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal by Evergreen Terrace owners, who tried to block the city’s case on constitutional grounds.

Joliet’s lawsuit seeking eminent domain still is pending in federal court. HUD is a defendant in the condemnation action.

Federal officials said they will seek to consolidate the suit filed Thursday with the one pending.

A tenant of Evergreen Terrace also filed a fair housing complaint with HUD in 2009, alleging that Joliet’s actions violated the Fair Housing Act. HUD referred the complaint to the Justice Department.

Reporter Jon Seidel
contributed to this report.