O.C. Mobile Home Park in Bias Suit Settlement

Carl and Marilyn Johnson had hoped to move into a mobile home in Santa Ana to save money so that Marilyn would not have to go back to work while their daughter was still a toddler.

But when they inquired about rates and rules at Plaza Mobile Estates, they were allegedly told that the park lacked facilities for children and severely limited children’s use of the swimming pool.

“I remember the managers asking us, ‘What kind of a parent are you that you would want to have a child living in a mobile home park?’ ” Marylin Johnson, 40, of Santa Ana said Monday.

“But we knew it was wrong,” she said. “We both walked out of there saying people can’t be treated like this.”

That rebuff on Monday became part of the largest federal settlement of a case alleging housing discrimination against families with children.

While denying the allegations, the owners of six mobile home parks in California and one in Washington state agreed to pay more than $2 million to settle a suit brought against them by the Justice Department and civil rights lawyers in Pasadena.

They also agreed to make their mobile homes, pools, recreation halls and other facilities equally available to families with and without children, to notify the public that they welcome families with children and to train their managers in fair housing law.

The settlement “is a victory for all families with children, particularly those of modest income who benefit most from the availability of mobile homes,” said Deval L. Patrick, assistant attorney general for civil rights.

Bert Voorhees, one of the Pasadena attorneys who intervened in the suit for the Johnsons and a class of similar families, said the settlement “vindicates the rights of families to live in any home they choose. . . . It sends a clear message to the mobile home park industry that discriminating against families simply because they have children will cost you dearly.”

Carl Johnson, 39, agreed.

“The most positive thing out of all of this is that it probably will give a family with kids a chance to live in a place they can afford,” he said.

His wife added, “A lot of people can’t afford a condominium or a townhouse, and with a mobile home, yes, you had your space rent, but you didn’t need $8,000 or $10,000 down and closing costs on top of that. We felt real strongly that other people shouldn’t be subjected to that.”

Also celebrating Monday was Charlotte Suitor, the Costa Mesa Realtor who had accompanied the Johnsons on their interview at the mobile home park seven years ago and who initiated the investigation into discrimination practices.

“The interview at the park was nothing but negative,” Suitor said. “They had said to Carl and Marilyn things like, ‘If your daughter cries and we get three complaints we can evict you.’ ”

After the interview, she said, “I called an 800 number in Washington, D.C., and filed a complaint. Then I called Marilyn and Carl and told them I thought their civil rights had been violated. I also told the sellers of the mobile home what I had done; then I called the park and told them I’d filed a complaint.”

The settlement, approved by U.S. District Judge Robert M. Takasugi, makes available more than $2.2 million to families with children who lived in--or were discouraged from living in--the seven mobile home parks since March 1989, when families with children were added to the Fair Housing Law’s protections.

Families with children who are found to have been deterred from renting or who suffered discriminatory treatment will share in the $2.2-million fund. So far, 177 families are in the class, but attorneys expect several hundred more to come forward, they said. No family will receive more than $5,000 unless it can prove additional damages. Any funds remaining will go to local fair housing groups.

In addition to Plaza Mobile Estates in Santa Ana, the California parks are Rancho Fiesta Mobile Estates in Visalia, Laurel Canyon Mobile Estates in Sun Valley, Eastridge Mobile Estates in San Jose, Sierra Vista Mobile Estates in Hanford and Plantation Mobile Estates in Healdsburg. The Washington park is Camelot Mobile Estates in Bremerton. Families with children who lived in the mobile home parks or were deterred from applying there can contact the Justice Department’s housing and civil enforcement section or the Pasadena law firm of Traber, Voorhees & Olguin, the department said.

The settlement did not end the case. Joseph Sherman, one of the defendants, refused to go along with the settlement, and litigation against other mobile home parks in which he has an interest and which allegedly have discriminated against families with children will be pursued, according to the Justice Department and Voorhees.

The parks include Monterey Vista in Watsonville, Park Monterey in Rosemead, Park Santa Anita in Monrovia, Rancho la Puenta and Rancho la Seda mobile parks in La Puente, Ranco Heroso in Sylmar, Sierra Pines in Riverside, Upland Eldorado Mobile Estates in Upland and Walnut Hills in Pomona.

Justice Department officials say complaints of discrimination against families with children account for the largest number of federal fair housing cases. They help explain the sharp increase in fair housing cases--200 in fiscal 1994, compared to about 10 a year before the law was amended to prohibit discrimination against families with children and the handicapped.

Times staff writer Lisa Richardson contributed to this report.