Baez v. New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance

Background

Wanda Baez, Siide Gil-Frederick, Danielle Johnson, and Residents to Preserve Public Housing (RPPH) brought a proposed class action against the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) and the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA). The complaint also named Barbara C. Guinn, who was OTDA’s commissioner during the relevant period, in her individual capacity.

The plaintiffs alleged that OTDA and NYCHA discriminated against Black and Hispanic or Latino public-housing tenants in administering the Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP). They asserted claims under the Fair Housing Act, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, New York State human-rights laws, and negligence. They alleged that OTDA deprioritized subsidized-housing tenants for ERAP assistance and that NYCHA failed to timely recertify household incomes and recalculate rent after tenants reported financial hardship.

Baez and Gil-Frederick applied for ERAP assistance in 2021 but did not receive benefits during the height of the pandemic; they later received the maximum number of months available to subsidized tenants. Johnson did not apply because, according to the complaint, she was never informed about ERAP. RPPH alleged that it represented public-housing tenants affected by the lack of assistance.

Rulings on the State Defendants

The court first considered the State Defendants’ challenge to subject-matter jurisdiction. It agreed that the plaintiffs did not plausibly connect OTDA’s actions to NYCHA’s alleged failure to recertify tenant incomes. OTDA administered ERAP funding but did not oversee or control NYCHA’s actions. The court therefore addressed the State Defendants’ other defenses.

The court held that Guinn was entitled to qualified immunity. Qualified immunity protects government officials from personal liability unless their conduct violated a clearly established statutory or constitutional right. The court found that no Supreme Court or Second Circuit precedent clearly established that deprioritizing subsidized tenants in an emergency program enacted during the pandemic violated antidiscrimination law. The court granted the motion to dismiss all claims against Guinn.

The court also held that OTDA was protected by sovereign immunity, which generally prevents suits against a state or its agencies in federal court unless the state waived that protection or Congress validly removed it. The court found no waiver by New York and no sufficient congressional removal of immunity under the Fair Housing Act. It also rejected the argument that accepting federal funds alone waived immunity. The court granted the motion to dismiss all claims against OTDA.

Rulings on NYCHA

The court held that Baez and Gil-Frederick lacked standing to seek relief concerning ERAP benefits because they had already received the maximum amount of assistance available to them. Standing is the requirement that a plaintiff show a concrete injury that the court can likely remedy. The court held that Johnson also lacked standing because she never applied for ERAP and the complaint did not show that she was ready and able to apply but was prevented from doing so by the challenged policy.

The court separately held that RPPH lacked standing. Although RPPH alleged that it had diverted resources to address NYCHA’s conduct, the court found that the alleged failure to recertify tenant income did not directly prevent RPPH from pursuing its stated mission of preserving public housing and opposing conversion to project-based Section 8. The organization’s decision to spend resources on the litigation was not enough to establish a concrete injury.

The court also held that the Fair Housing Act claims against NYCHA were filed outside the statute of limitations. It rejected the plaintiffs’ argument that NYCHA’s alleged continuing failure to recertify incomes created a continuing violation that extended the filing deadline. The court concluded that the plaintiffs knew of the alleged violations well before the action was filed and that later rent-collection proceedings did not restart the limitations period. The court granted the motion to dismiss all claims against NYCHA based on lack of standing and the statute of limitations.

Disposition

The court expressly stated that it was dismissing the NYCHA claims on procedural grounds and therefore did not decide the merits of the discrimination allegations. In its conclusion, the court granted the motions to dismiss the First Amended Complaint filed by OTDA, NYCHA, and Guinn, directed the Clerk to terminate the pending motions, and closed the case. The opinion does not state that the dismissal was with or without prejudice.