Members of the Eastern Connecticut Association of Realtors heard a cautionary tale Wednesday in Norwich about the lingering effects of housing discrimination in the Northeast.

Bill Dedman, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter from Westport now working for Newsday in Long Island, recounted the surprising results of a three-year investigation he led titled “Long Island Divided” that found people of color looking to buy homes were treated unequally about 40% of the time.

“These are practices that need to change -- and change quickly,” Dedman told the crowd of about 120 at the Norwich Inn & Spa during ECAR’s annual Membership Meeting.

“We're going to focus on best practices, specific steps that brokers and agents can take. ... You could think of it to make sure that you're serving your communities in the best way you can. You could think of it as obeying the law and being able to keep the broker's license.”

Dedman’s investigation, done with the knowledge and support of the National Association of Realtors, used people of different races or ethnic backgrounds who nevertheless had the same income levels, family situations and desire for a house at the same price point to compare how minorities were treated versus white people. In many cases, white clients were steered away from areas of Long Island where there was a significant minority population, while people of color with the same homebuying criteria were told “you might like” the same areas.

Dedman’s undercover investigators wore hidden cameras, which is legal in New York, and they caught other outrageous behavior, including one broker telling a Black homebuyer that she wouldn’t show her any houses unless she was prequalified to get a loan, but then she agreed to show a white buyer who also was not prequalified dozens of homes.

Yet such behavior largely goes unreported simply because there is no way for most people to know that others are being treated differently just because of the color of their skin.

“The absence of complaints tells you nothing about whether or not your office is obeying the law,” Dedman said.

And Dedman suggested that illegal practices such as steering white people to white neighborhoods and Black people to racially diverse areas are not necessarily fixed by diversity in hiring practices and promotions at real estate agencies. That’s because his investigation found that real estate agents from all different backgrounds tended to treat minorities differently.

“People often ask, ‘Were the minority real estate agents also discriminating?’ Yes, they were. You'll see them in the videos. And that's just as illegal,” Dedman said.

Dedman said the best fix for making sure that everyone is treated the same is for agencies to institute standard procedures when dealing with customers. If it’s the policy of the agency not to show houses unless a client is prequalified, then be consistent with everyone who comes in the door, he said.

“It seemed clear that the Realtors in our test had no checklist, had no standard procedure for what they asked for and what they gave to each of the buyers,” Dedman said.

Sometimes, the steering is overt with references to the racial makeup of a town, Dedman said, but frequently it is much more subtle. Agents often use proxies for towns with large minority populations by referring to crime, school ratings and resale value, he said.

“So often the agents would tell our buyers ‘everything is decided by schools. That school's in decline and this one is is in demand,’ and then they would give different information (to different buyers, based on race),” Dedman said. “Realtors are not experts in schools and do not know which schools are good and which ones are bad ... so stop picking their schools for them. Stop encouraging one school over another.”

Dedman also said that school test scores really tell more about the affluence of a town than how good its schools are. Steering people to so-called “high-performing schools” does nothing other than perpetuate segregation, he suggested.

Dedman said his testing did not find much in the way of overt discrimination. Everyone seemed to be treated courteously while visiting with real estate agents, but not everyone was treated the same. About half of Black clients were treated differently from whites given exactly the same circumstances, resulting in only two of 12 agencies investigated on Long Island passing all their tests.

“Would the results be any different if we conducted the tests in your communities ... If we did a hundred of those tests this weekend in Norwich or New London or Windham,” he asked.

Connecticut actually has looser fair housing regulations than New York, he suggested, and no requirement for training. But Connecticut law allows the same kind of hidden-camera testing conducted on Long Island.

“So two buyers who walk into your real estate office can record you without you knowing that you're being recorded,” he said. “Even in states where recording is not allowed, be aware that we can still do testing. Because we can work with the buyer to see all the text messages that you send them, to see all the emails that you send them.”

To stem concerns over discrimination and the possible lawsuits that could result, the National Realtors Association is imposing continuing education in fair housing on all its members starting next year, which is more than what Connecticut law now requires.

“The industry thinking seems to be if we don't get ahead of this then there will be more embarrassing media investigations, there will be more government regulation,” Dedman said. “Besides, there is a recognition that it's the right thing to do and that it's a law, that fair housing is the law.”

He added that trying to root out discrimination isn’t as easy as identifying the bigot in the office; steering often arises from good intentions, the idea of providing the best perceived results for clients.

“There's too much steering going on for only bad people to be doing it,” Dedman said. “Good people have to be doing it, too.”

Lee Howard is The Day’s business editor. Reach him at l.howard@theday.com for comments and story ideas.