Speaking at the Fair Housing and the Latino Community Breakfast Roundtable at Pasadena City Hall, added that there have been around 4,300 complaints in the past year to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development about lending practices regarding Hispanics.

In addition, Schiff said that along with disability, race is the chief complaint the department receives, saying that more than 10,000 of them have been logged in the past year.

With this being Hispanic Heritage Month, Schiff and John Trasvina, assistant secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity with HUD, said now is a good time to look at the problem.

"What government ought to be doing is using Hispanic Heritage Month as a way to focus on issues we are working on the entire year," Trasvina said. "It is interesting to look at the (federal Fair Housing Act) at race, color, religion, disability, and how it's expanded to include woman's rights and gender discrimination."

Trasvina added Hispanics are often targets of lenders who are trying to take advantage of them.

"Latinos get into predatory loans more frequently than you would expect based upon income," he said. "Even at higher levels of income, Hispanics ... get into more subprime loans."

So, how is the federal government battling the problem?

"We work with a number of different organizations and work as the bridge between the government and the community," he said. "We want to know those facing housing discrimination can come to our office and get relief."

In addition, Trasvina said landlords do not have the right to check on or discriminate against those in regards to assumed or real immigration status.

"The landlord does not have that authority or ability to check someone's immigration status," he said. "Even when the government is able to shut down (local discriminatory laws), there is still the atmosphere for discrimination. We will provide education so people know their rights in housing and what their responsibilities are."

In regards to predatory lending, Trasvina said it is difficult to prosecute because the patterns are difficult to prove.

"We do have a number of cases in discriminatory lending, but if there's a pattern we're not quite to that point," he said. "What we do is test. It's very difficult in the lending area. It doesn't work there. But we have databases and look at buyers and lenders and look at the statistics we have."

(Shel Segal can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .)