Featured Cases
This lawsuit on behalf of a Colorado disability rights organization and four individual members alleges that a major plasma donation center excludes people with a variety of disabilities from its services.
This lawsuit, brought on behalf of an organization and two individuals against HUD challenging its delay of the Small Area Fair Market Rent pilot program, secured a decision allowing poor families in major markets around the country to immediately use rental subsidies to move to higher-opportunity areas.
In 2016, Relman Colfax settled the largest affordable housing accessibility case in the nation’s history, securing an important victory for people with disabilities in Los Angeles and adding at least 4,000 affordable and highly accessible housing units in the city. The firm separately settled with the City's Community Redevelopment Agency in 2017.
In this Fair Housing Act case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that a real estate agent could be held liable for disability discrimination.
Federal court holds fifth-largest private apartment developer in the country liable for a “continuing violation” of federal accessibility requirements. Settlement required retrofitting of 12,300 apartment units at 82 apartment complexes in 11 states, with a total settlement value of nearly $15 million.
After federal court granted summary judgment for the firm’s client, case settled, requiring County to spend nearly $52 million in County funds to develop at least 750 affordable housing units in high-opportunity neighborhoods.
Publications
M. Allen, “Speaking Truth to Power: Enhancing Community Engagement in the Assessment of Fair Housing Process,” in Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University (forthcoming 2018)
M. Allen & J. Crook, "More Than Just Race: Proliferation of Protected Groups and the Increasing Influence of the Act,” in The Fight for Fair Housing (G. Squires, ed.) (2018)
M. Allen, J. Crook & J. Relman, Assessing HUD's Disparate Impact Rule: A Practitioner's Perspective, 49 Harv. C.R-C.L. L. Rev 155 (Spring 2014)
R. Schwemm & M. Allen, For the Rest of Their Lives: Seniors and the Fair Housing Act, 90 Iowa L. Rev. 121 (2004)
S. Pratt & M. Allen, Addressing Community Opposition to Affordable Housing Development: A Fair Housing Toolkit, Housing Alliance of Pennsylvania (2004)