A Monument to Fair Housing

By Brian Summerfield, Online Editor, REALTOR® Magazine

Many of today’s REALTORS® might not realize it, but 1968 was a tough year. Dr. Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy were assassinated, the Tet Offensive was launched against U.S. forces in Vietnam, and the Soviet Union crushed the Prague Spring liberalization movement in Czechoslovakia.

Yet it was also a year of hope. One bright spot was the passage of the Fair Housing Act, which outlaws discrimination against home buyers on the basis of their background.

Now, more than four decades later, the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® will commemorate Fair Housing with a monument located in a park adjacent to its Washington D.C. offices at 500 New Jersey Ave., NW.

Martin Edwards, chair of NAR’s operations committee, proposed the new landmark during his presentation to the association’s Board of Directors Saturday at the 2009 Midyear Legislative Meetings. The board unanimously agreed to construct and maintain the monument, and NAR will now seek approval for the project from the National Park Service.