At any time of day, the welcoming day rooms and lounges of Fellowship Towers are dotted with calm, cheerful people living out their retirements in secure, attractive surroundings. For nearly twenty years, the tall building at 222 East Indianola Avenue has opened its arms to hundreds of old men and women in need of a clean, well-lighted place to live. And for nearly twenty years, every single one of them has been white.
That is not unusual in Phoenix. What is unusual is that each month, thousands of dollars in federal rent subsidies pour into Fellowship Towers, dollars meant to ensure that its aged tenants are housed safely and comfortably. Federal housing officials chime praises for the good management and orderly appearance of the high-rise retirement home, founded and run by the fraternal order of Arizona Odd Fellows and Rebekahs.
But in all the time Fellowship Towers has enjoyed the benefits of federal housing subsidies, loans and a tax-free status, it has never opened its arms to a single black person seeking a home--in fact, it is the only federally subsidized old folks housing in Phoenix with no blacks.
Odd Fellow officials in charge of the home say there's nothing sinister going on. They claim that personal preference and, yes, pure chance are the reasons no black has lived at Fellowship Towers since its founding in 1972.
"Bull," says one former employee.
"When I came to work here, the former manager, whose wife is still on the board of directors, told me, `The only way you'll ever get fired from this job is to steal money or let a nigger in the front door,'" says Robert Pratt of Scottsdale, who managed Fellowship Towers from 1988 until his firing in July of 1989.
Pratt is one of a half-dozen former employees interviewed by New Times who claim discrimination against blacks is a verbal, if not written, policy laid down and stringently enforced by the home's directors, all influential members of the state Odd Fellows organization. The whistle-blowers allege that applications filed by blacks were tossed in the trash, and the blacks who persisted were told, "You wouldn't feel comfortable here." Employees who questioned discriminatory practices were subject to harassment and termination, they say.
Finally, last December, an office worker disgusted with what she calls "blatant racism" decided somebody had to spill the beans about what was going on at Fellowship Towers. Surely, thought Vicky Passwater, somebody in charge of enforcing state or federal fair-housing laws would care.
After all, even as she put pen to paper, the state Attorney General's Office had begun lobbying state legislators to expand its jurisdiction and, of course, its funding in the area of fair-housing law.
Passwater had supporting statements from her former boss, Bob Pratt, as well as several other former employees. She had at least one damning document in her possession: a copy of an application on which a Fellowship Towers employee had written, "This man is very black."
But if Vicky Passwater expected a hero's welcome, or even tough action, from the officials who enforce antidiscrimination laws in this state, she was in for a big surprise.
VICKY AND MAURICE PASSWATER first came to Fellowship Towers as maintenance workers in 1988. They had been hired by Bob Pratt, who was manager at the time. As one of their benefits, the Passwaters lived on-site in a rent-free apartment.
"We thought it was a nice place," says Vicky. "The residents were friendly. Bob was great. We really liked it."
Almost at once, says Maurice, he was approached by a resident recruiting for the Odd Fellows. This was not unusual, according to Pratt.
"I was approached to join the organization when I applied for the job," Pratt says. "They said it wasn't mandatory but that things would go better for me if I was a member."
Passwater says he was told the same thing, and joined willingly. At the same time, his wife felt pressured to join the women's auxiliary, the Rebekahs. "It was put to me pretty much as, `You are expected to join Rebekahs if your husband is an Odd Fellow,'" Vicky Passwater recalls.
The Odd Fellows had founded Fellowship Towers in 1972 through a nonprofit organization, the Arizona Odd Fellows-Rebekah Housing, Incorporated. They manage the home through the corporation's board of directors, and Pratt estimates that up to one quarter of the home's approximately 200 residents are members of the group or its women's auxiliary.
However, Pratt notes, the directors are not exempt from federal fair-housing rules which prohibit discrimination based on color, creed or religion. There is also a prohibition against limiting residency to members of the two sponsoring societies.
"The home's owners actually are under a double obligation to avoid discrimination because they are so heavily subsidized by the federal government," Pratt says. The Odd Fellows built Fellowship Towers using a $5 million loan, obtained at 1 percent interest, from the Federal Home Mortgage Association. The home also receives $14,000 each month from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which subsidizes rents on all but 40 of the 180 apartments.
But once they began attending Odd Fellows and Rebekah meetings, both Pratt and the Passwaters say they encountered unabashed bigotry--toward blacks, in particular. "It was almost surreal, like they were living in another time," Pratt says. "At meetings of the Fellowship Towers board, the directors would brag openly to me that, `There's never been a nigger and damn few Jews and Mexicans here.' "Their written policy called for a series of screening committees to review an application from anyone questionable, which could include a suspected alcoholic or bad credit risk," Pratt says. "But I was given to understand any application from a black was automatically in that category." Since applications had to be made in person, racial identifications were easy to make.
