A Potential Injustice

[Brian Phillips]

In 2015, The Texas Legislature passed a bill that prohibits local governments from forcing landlords to accept housing vouchers. Sen. Royce West has submitted a bill that would repeal that prohibition and make it illegal to refuse to rent to an individual on the basis of his source of income. Housing advocates claim that, because a large percentage of voucher users are black, the refusal to accept vouchers is veiled form of racism.

Landlords can have legitimate reasons for refusing to accept vouchers. The process for a property to be accepted into a voucher program can take months, and during that time the property is vacant and producing no income. A landlord may validly conclude that the hassle and expense of accepting vouchers is not worth it.

I have been a landlord for more than ten years. Nearly all of my tenants have been black, and I have never accepted housing vouchers. My refusal has nothing to do with race. It has everything to do with the additional expenses and the hassle of the process. Forcing me to accept vouchers would make my judgment, and that of every landlord in the state, meaningless. It would mean treating us in a manner that we do not deserve. It would be an injustice.