Racially restrictive covenants haven’t been enforceable since the 1948 Supreme Court ruling in Shelley v. Kraemer, but the language in them persists in many land records. It’s not an insignificant number either. In just San Diego County, NPR and Inewsource found 10,000 records containing this type of language. Some areas, like Marin County, have already established outreach programs to remove the language, but soon all other counties will need to start removing the language under California Assembly Bill No. 1466. The bill was sponsored by State Assemblymember Kevin McCarty, who was inspired to act when he saw a racially restrictive covenant in the documents of a property he was purchasing.
The bill outlines just how soon counties will need to act:
“This bill would require the county recorder of each county to establish a restrictive covenant program to assist in the redaction of unlawfully restrictive covenants. In this regard, the bill would require each county recorder to prepare an implementation plan by July 1, 2022, as specified, identify unlawfully restrictive covenants in the records of their office, and to redact unlawfully restrictive covenants, as specified. The bill would require the County Recorders Association of California to submit reports to the Legislature by January 1, 2023, and January 1, 2025, of the progress of each county’s restrictive covenant program and to annually convene a best practices meeting to share concepts on the implementation of restrictive covenant programs, as specified.”
Counties will need to get to work quickly to be able to satisfy the bill’s requirements, but in our experience working with them on similar legislative redaction requirements, they’re adept at doing so. Since the implementation plans are unique to each county, local governments will want to consider things like how well their existing workflow can accommodate this new step. They’ll also need to determine their daily or monthly volume of both covenants that will need to be reviewed and pages within the covenant that could contain the objectionable language.
With court redaction, we’ve often seen counties make the removal of sensitive information the responsibility of the person filing documents. In California, with land records recording, there is currently a shared responsibility where both the county recorder and interested business parties (real estate agent, escrow company, etc.) will flag documents with a discriminatory housing covenant. The new law does seem to delineate responsibilities more, with interested parties needing to file a Restrictive Covenant Modification form while the county is responsible for reviewing the modifications with counsel (max turnaround three months) and aiding in redaction.
Each county will have its own needs, requirements, and constituents to answer to so it’s likely that each plan will be somewhat unique. For some smaller counties with lower recording volumes, a redaction process may fit naturally into the current reviews that are occurring, while those with the most activity will use an automated redaction software like Extract’s ID Shield. Our software is able to automatically read unstructured documents, identify the information you’re looking for, redact it so it’s completely irretrievable, and improve performance through continuous machine learning.
The balance for most counties will be to find a cost-effective way to redact these documents as a provision of this bill states that the existing recording fee can’t be used for any of these modifications. Sharing responsibility with constituents seems to be a reasonable way to do this, although as we mentioned, each county will find a unique solution.
If your county does need a solution to automate redaction, let us know, and we’d be happy to start with an introductory call or demonstration of our software.
About the Author: Chris Mack
Chris is a Marketing Manager at Extract with experience in product development, data analysis, and both traditional and digital marketing. Chris received his bachelor’s degree in English from Bucknell University and has an MBA from the University of Notre Dame. A passionate marketer, Chris strives to make complex ideas more accessible to those around him in a compelling way.