Public Housing Tenants Get Right to Sue

The tenants of low-income public housing may sue their landlords in federal court to gain their rights rather than wait for government officials to act on their complaints, the Supreme Court ruled Wednesday.

Attorneys and advocates for the poor said that the decision is significant because, they contended, officials of the Reagan Administration have not aggressively enforced the rights of the poor under the law. The ruling could affect 3 million public housing residents nationwide.

1969 Amendment

The right in question is contained in a 1969 amendment to the Housing Act in which Congress said that rents in public housing units should be limited to 25% of a tenant’s income. In addition, tenants could be charged a “reasonable” amount for utilities.

Brenda Wright, in a suit on behalf of 1,100 tenants of a low-income housing development in Roanoke, Va., complained in federal court there that the local housing authority--which worked under contract to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development--was adding exorbitant utility surcharges to her monthly bill.

But the court dismissed the complaint on the grounds that it was up to HUD, not the courts, to enforce the terms of the housing law. In 1985, an appeals court in Richmond upheld that decision.

Clear Legal Rights

In reversing that judgment on a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court concluded that the housing law gave the tenants clear legal rights and therefore the right to sue.

“In our view, the benefits Congress intended to confer on tenants are sufficiently specific and definite to qualify as enforceable rights,” wrote Justice Byron R. White. “The rights are not, as (the housing authority) suggests, beyond the competence of the judiciary to enforce.” White’s opinion was joined by the court’s liberal bloc: Justices William J. Brennan Jr., Thurgood Marshall, Harry A. Blackmun and John Paul Stevens.

The decision does not settle the case (Wright vs. Roanoke Redevelopment and Housing Authority, 85-5915) but returns it to a district court for trial. Local housing officials had contended also that the 1969 amendment was vague in its wording and did not give tenants a guarantee of low utility charges.

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor noted the same point in a dissent. “Neither the Brooke Amendment’s language, nor its legislative history, nor its interpretation by HUD supports the conclusion that Congress intended to create an entitlement to reasonable utilities,” she wrote, referring to the 1969 amendment. She was joined by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Lewis F. Powell Jr. and Antonin Scalia.

Police Search Upheld

In other cases decided Wednesday, the high court:

--Ruled 7 to 2 that police may use evidence found in an “inventory search” of seized vehicles. Steven Bertine was stopped by police officers in Boulder, Colo., on suspicion of speeding and drunken driving and his van was impounded. When officers inventoried the items inside it, they discovered three tin cans in a backpack, one of which contained cocaine. He was charged subsequently with possession of cocaine.

The Colorado Supreme Court said that the cocaine could not be used against Bertine because it was found in “an unreasonable search” without a warrant based on “probable cause” of drug possession. Rehnquist, writing for the high court, disagreed. He said that the evidence was admissible because the inventory search was a customary procedure by police “to ensure against claims of lost, stolen or vandalized property and to guard the police from danger.” Brennan and Marshall dissented (Colorado vs. Bertine, 85-889).

--Refused to decide whether President Reagan acted legally when, at the end of the congressional session in 1983, he “pocket-vetoed” a one-year restriction on military aid for El Salvador. Rep. Michael D. Barnes (D-Md.), joined by 33 members of the House, filed suit against his action, and the case loomed as a key test of the separation of powers between the President and Congress (Burke vs. Barnes, 85-781).