Marina neighbors use 1871 civil rights law to oppose Safeway housing project

Neighbors in San Francisco's Marina district are challenging a housing development planned at the Safeway site by citing the Civil Rights Act of 1871, also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act, according to the San Francisco Standard.

The residents allege that the city violated their due process rights by approving the project without holding a public hearing, and they also claim violations of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, a federal hazardous waste law.

Their case was initially assigned to a judge with experience in PG&E pollution cases, but the opponents failed to keep it there.

The developer's attorneys from the firm Holland & Knight are now seeking to have the civil rights claim dismissed.

This legal strategy is notable as it draws on a law originally intended to combat the Ku Klux Klan, repurposed here to address local housing development disputes.