Thousands of Marylanders, mostly African-American, are denied housing based on their source of income, but efforts to mitigate such discrimination are finally making headway, advocates say. For 20 years, advocates have been waging a battle to pass legislation, the Maryland Housing Opportunities Made Equal (HOME) Act, to stop source-of-income discrimination across the state.

In contrast to more affluent areas of Oakland or nearby Berkeley, rooftop solar installations are uncommon among East and West Oakland flatland residents. This isn’t surprising, considering that the median income in one heavily polluted corridor in the Hegenberger area is under $33,000 annually. Vien Truong, environmental equity director for the Berkeley-based Greenlining Institute, which advocates for communities of color, says that “solar financing is out of reach” for low-income households.