Freedom to Discriminate author Gene Slater - July Speaker Meeting

We met July 24 to hear from Gene Slater, author of Freedom to Discriminate: How Realtors Conspire to Segregate Housing and Divide America

We dove into the documented history of the National and California Associations of REALTORS. REALTOR(r) is a registered trademark of a small but powerful group of real estate agents who have, since 1902, have conspired to drive up home prices with covert and overt tactics that continue driving our housing and homelessness crises.

Despite a belated public apology in 2021 for racist and illegal undermining of Fair Housing laws, California REALTORs continue to pour millions into public elections to limit renter protections and extract more profit from housing prices by restricting choices. 

How does this tie in to Gray Panther efforts to limit damage from high wealth hedge funds and other "private equity" funds buying into affordable housing and nursing homes? After a short break, we will discuss ways to raise these issues and more.

Gene discussed his insights into the conflicting definitions of freedom created by REALTOR disinformation campaigns. 

Gene Slater has 40 years experience in housing justice through housing finance. His firm, CSG Advisors, is one of the nation’s leading advisors to governmental agencies at all levels. He has designed policies and programs more than $70 billion of financing for first-time home buyers, low-income renters, mixed-income apartments, neighborhood revitalization, and improved public housing in cities, small towns, and suburbs in all parts of the US for the past 40 years. In 2020, he began speaking publicly on the history of housing segregation in the US, publishing his book in 2021 with Heydey Press. Since 2022, he has been working with Congress on policies to limit the impacts of private equity pension funds and hedge funds in local housing markets. He currently works and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.