LOS ANGELES — The city of Los Angeles will pay $38.2 million to settle a 2017 lawsuit after federal documents “falsely” stated that multi-family affordable housing built with federal funds was accessible to people with disabilities.
The complaint was filed by the U.S. Department of Justice on behalf of Los Angeles resident Mei Ling, who uses a wheelchair, and the Fair Housing Council of San Fernando Valley, a disability rights advocacy group. Their share of the settlement has not yet been determined.
Ling, 57, has used a wheelchair since January 2006 and is either homeless or lives in a home without accessibility features, the lawsuit says.
It was alleged that the city of LA has failed to make its multifamily affordable housing options accessible to people with disabilities for at least six years. Among the problems were ramps that were too steep, counters that were too high and entrances that did not provide wheelchair access, officials said.
The lawsuit also alleged that the city failed to maintain a public list of accessible units and their accessibility features, and that it “knowingly and falsely” represented to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that it met those requirements, violating the False Claims Act, the lawsuit said.
“The city denies that it violated the False Claims Act,” L.A. City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto said in an emailed statement. “Nevertheless, we are pleased to have reached this $38.2 million settlement, particularly in light of the federal government’s initial claim that it was entitled to well over $1 billion in alleged damages.”
When the Housing and Urban Development Department provides grant money to local governments to build and renovate affordable multifamily housing, they must comply with federal accessibility laws, officials said. That includes a mandate that 5 percent of all units in certain types of federally assisted housing be accessible to people with mobility disabilities, and another 2 percent be accessible to people with visual and hearing impairments.
They must also maintain a publicly available list of accessible homes, describing their accessibility features and other home accessibility requirements.
In the six years prior to the 2017 lawsuit, L.A. received nearly $1 billion in various federal housing agency funds that went to at least 28 multifamily housing projects, the plaintiffs allege. None of them contained the legally required minimum number of accessible units.
Meanwhile, the city “led HUD and the public to believe that it was in compliance with all federal obligations regarding the receipt of federal housing and community development funds,” the lawsuit says.
In the past the city settled a similar lawsuit in 2016.