The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California (ACLU) announced Tuesday it filed a complaint to the state’s civil rights agency alleging Riverside officials violated anti-discrimination laws before, during and after a vote to reject $20 million in state funds for an affordable housing project.
“There were a number of comments made by the council members that really conflated someone’s unhoused status with having certain behavioral health needs and then equating both of those things with criminality,” Kath Rogers, the ACLU senior staff attorney who filed the complaint, told The Riverside Record. “Those are the types of stereotypes that we’re looking at in terms of the discrimination that motivated the vote.”
The complaint, filed with the California Civil Rights Department, alleged that Council members Philip Falcone, Steven Robillard, Chuck Conder and Sean Mill made the decision to not accept the state grant based on “explicitly discriminatory remarks against the people who would stand to benefit” from the motel conversion project…