A year ago, a Kalihi nonprofit launched a massive project to root out housing discrimination against Micronesians — a problem, advocates at the agency say, that has grown with the influx of Micronesians to the Islands.

So far, Kokua Legal Services has settled one lawsuit with a landlord — who agreed to pay more than $10,000, though admitting no wrongdoing — has filed another and is pursuing some half-dozen other landlords, the nonprofit said.

Under the ongoing program, some 500 landlords with rentals on the market have been called, with Micronesians and Caucasians posing as potential renters.

Members of the Micronesian community say the project raises much-needed awareness for renters and landlords, and is a vital step toward creating a fair housing market for Micronesians.

The project adds teeth to efforts to enforce fair housing laws and overcomes one of the main obstacles — victims being reluctant to come forward. And it could become a model for other advocacy agencies trying to stop housing discrimination against Hawai'i residents in all sorts of protected classes.

On the Mainland, several organizations, including the National Fair Housing Alliance, have kicked off similar projects and achieved positive results.

Micronesian leaders in Hawai'i hope the project has lasting effects.

They say blatant as well as subtle housing discrimination against new Micronesian immigrants and longtime residents alike continues to go largely unchecked. They also say it goes largely unreported because of fears about coming forward, language barriers and a lack of services to address the need.

"It seems to be getting worse," added Maria Narruhn, a founding member of Micronesians United, which has been trying to address housing discrimination, but whose resources are limited.

Narruhn said she knows 10 families who have been turned away from rentals on the market in the last year, and were likely discriminated against. Some of the cases involved the landlord actually saying Micronesians weren't welcome.

She believes two of her own family members were also victims of housing discrimination, including her son-in-law, who inquired about a one-bedroom for $995 and was told, when he looked at the unit, that the rent had jumped to $1,020.

With more Micronesians coming to the Islands every year, looking for employment and medical care, advocates say more attention needs to be paid to complaints of housing discrimination against them. Some also say the housing issue could be symptomatic of a larger discrimination problem.

Narruhn and others said many people hold negative stereotypes about Micronesians, which affect not only whether they get into a rental unit, but could affect whether they get a job. Micronesians are already at a disadvantage when they come to Hawai'i, Narruhn added, because many speak little English.

A GROWING POPULATION

Estimates put the Micronesian population in Hawai'i between 10,000 and 20,000. State officials and service providers say they are struggling to meet the needs of the growing group. And since many Micronesians need help with more immediate needs, such as healthcare and housing, advocates say the issue of housing discrimination has been put on the back burner.

That's left those trying to address the problem hard-pressed to pinpoint the scope of the problem. No service providers in Hawai'i collect data on the extent of housing discrimination against Micronesians and few have housing discrimination services tailored to members of the population, with interpreters and outreach programs.

In fact, agencies have little way of determining just how pervasive housing discrimination is among the entire population, much less a segment of the state, because of underreporting and an unwillingness among victims to follow through with complaints, which can take a year or more to adjudicate or settle.

Of the 43 cases of housing discrimination filed with the state Civil Rights Commission in fiscal year 2007, nine were based on race, national origin or color. The category of discrimination was the second most common among cases filed. The top reason for housing discrimination was disability status.

The commission does not track complaints by ethnicity or race and so could not say whether any ongoing cases involve Micronesians. Christopher Jones, deputy director of the commission, also said he did not know whether housing discrimination against Micronesians was any worse than against other groups.

Members of Micronesians United and other advocates say part of the reason the problem is so difficult to quantify is because many Micronesians don't come forward, either because they are afraid to or because they don't know where to go. Language barriers also prevent reporting.

Michael Shiroma, city fair housing officer, said Micronesians also have few places to turn for help, since many nonprofits do not have the money for interpreters and outreach programs.

"Micronesians aren't an underserved population, they're an unserved population," Shiroma said.

The problem is even more acute on the Neighbor Islands, where services are fewer and further between. Ron Fujiyoshi, a supporter of Micronesians United on the Big Island, said churches that serve Micronesians have started to address the problem, mostly by urging people to stick up for themselves against housing discrimination and other injustices.

"We're telling them to be like Jesus, be bold and persistent," Fujiyoshi said. "Micronesians themselves are so polite that they're easy to turn down. Even if they know they've been treated badly, it's not easy to get them to take action on their own."

But not everyone agrees housing discrimination against Micronesians is solely based on their national origin. The Rev. Akendo Onamwar, who leads the Micronesian congregation at Church of the Crossroads, said he has heard of cases that would likely qualify as housing discrimination against Micronesians, but he said the discrimination was likely based on the number of children a family had, the number of extended family members or other factors.

"It may be because of our big families," he said. "It may because of our language barriers."

Onamwar also said Micronesian custom dictates that families help each other, which means one family could invite several other families in need of shelter to live with them. He said he understands why a landlord would be wary about having several families living under the same roof.

HOW THEY HELP

The Kokua Legal Services project started in January 2006, after board members at the nonprofit saw several cases dealing with housing discrimination and heard from community members that the problem was real.

Jory Watland, president of Kokua Legal Services and a founding member of the board, said most of the clients the nonprofit sees are Micronesian. Of the 150 cases it handles a year, about one-third deal with housing and a number of those are often linked to discrimination, he said.

"We want to address the need in the community," Watland said. The project, he added, is designed to "rectify the unwarranted ... discrimination" against Micronesians.

There are four employees at Kokua Legal Services working on the project, along with civil-rights attorney Lunsford Phillips, who gained notoriety in the 1990s for filing a host of lawsuits against businesses that were allegedly not in compliance with American with Disabilities Act requirements. Phillips could not be reached for comment yesterday.

The project is similar to landlord testing work the Legal Aid Society of Hawai'i has also done.

But Cynthia Thomas, manager of the Fair Housing Project at the society, noted that the society has never filed a lawsuit based on landlord tests, and also has never focused on discrimination against Micronesians.

Thomas said there is legal precedent for testing projects suing landlords for discrimination. So far, though, she said Legal Aid has not found conclusive evidence through its tests.

Testers have found "hints of discrimination," she said, in which cases Legal Aid attorneys call or write the landlord to give them more information on state and federal fair housing laws.

The first lawsuit Kokua Legal Services filed as part of the project involved a landlord, who was advertising a two-bedroom unit in 'Aiea. According to court documents, a Micronesian tester at Kokua Legal Services called the 'Aiea landlord to inquire about the apartment and was told it was not available. The landlord also told the caller that he had no other units available, the documents allege.

Fifteen minutes later, a Caucasian tester at Kokua Legal Service called the landlord to inquire about the apartment and was told it was available. The landlord also allegedly told the tester he had other rentals that were empty.

The lawsuit filed by Kokua Legal Services in July 2006 said the Micronesian caller identified herself as Micronesian before inquiring about the rental.

The case was settled in May. The landlord and his attorney declined comment on the case, citing a confidentiality agreement as part of the settlement. The terms of the settlement agreement were not made public, but Watland said the landlord agreed to pay the plaintiffs more than $10,000.

Kokua Legal Services filed its second lawsuit as part of the project in September, alleging that two landlords who were renting a North King Street unit for $2,000 a month discriminated against a Micronesian tester, then offered the unit to a Caucasian caller.

In an October answer to the complaint, the landlords denied the allegations. The landlords could not be reached for comment, and lawyers for the two did not return calls.

Reach Mary Vorsino at mvorsino@honoluluadvertiser.com.