RIVERSIDE, Calif. — The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California filed a formal complaint Tuesday with the California Civil Rights Department against Riverside, alleging the city violated anti-discrimination laws when it voted in February to reject a $20.1 million state Homekey+ grant.
The Homekey+ grant was intended to provide supportive services and housing for veterans and individuals who are unhoused or at risk of becoming unhoused because of mental health or substance abuse issues.
The funding would have supported the Riverside Housing Development Corporation plan to convert the Quality Inn into 114 units of permanent supportive housing. The housing would have included 55-year affordability covenants to ensure the units remain accessible to low- and moderate-income households.
Clarissa Cervantes of the Riverside City Council was the strongest advocate for the project, which would have been located in her district. The project was rejected on a 4-3 vote by the Riverside City Council.
The complaint alleges the council’s decision to reject the project was based on “discriminatory stereotypes and fear-based assumptions about people experiencing homelessness and individuals with disabilities.” It also alleges certain council members made inflammatory comments about those groups.
Chuck Conder, for example, said the project would become an “epicenter of crime,” where “felonies including the use, sale and manufacture of illegal drugs; human trafficking, and prostitution run rampant.”
Ugochi Anaebere-Nicholson of the Public Interest Law Project criticized those remarks, saying, “Statements like these that equate homelessness and behavioral health disability with criminality and violence reflect the type of stigmatizing stereotypes that cannot lawfully form the basis for this decision.”
Several other council members were reportedly concerned that the project served populations beyond seniors or veterans. Framing the issue that way, however, suggests only certain unhoused individuals are deserving of support.
The city also cannot legally reject a permanent supportive housing project simply because it would serve people experiencing homelessness who have disabilities or behavioral health concerns, according to the ACLU.
Maribel Nunez of the Inland Equity Community Land Trust echoed that criticism, stating, “By rejecting this funding for new affordable housing, the City Council has voted against our entire community — and it perpetuated stereotypes against our unhoused neighbors and people with disabilities.”
Another civil rights concern raised in the complaint is that the project would have been located in a resource-rich area near transit, businesses and residential neighborhoods, as required under fair housing laws intended to integrate low-income individuals with disabilities. The complaint argues that goal was undermined by the council’s decision, which it says was based on “unfounded stereotypes.”
For Eve Garrow of the ACLU of Southern California, the decision was troubling but not surprising.
“The city’s rejection of the proposal fits within a long and troubling history of spatial segregation of low-income people with disabilities,” she said.
The complaint is not the only legal scrutiny facing the City Council.
In February, California’s Housing and Community Development Department informed the council that its Housing Accountability Unit was reviewing the decision for “potential violations of the state’s housing laws, including the city’s obligations under its Housing Element and its legal obligation to affirmatively further fair housing,” according to the ACLU.
The dispute comes as homelessness remains a serious crisis in Riverside County, where 140 people died without access to housing last year alone.
The ACLU complaint underscores growing tension between local land-use decisions and state fair housing mandates, while raising broader questions about how California cities respond to homelessness, disability rights and the urgent need for permanent supportive housing.
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