{"id":158249,"date":"2026-04-23T13:44:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T18:44:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=158249"},"modified":"2026-04-23T13:45:04","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T18:45:04","slug":"um-law-course-connects-housing-issues-to-oxfords-past-and-present","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/um-law-course-connects-housing-issues-to-oxfords-past-and-present\/","title":{"rendered":"UM Law Course Connects Housing Issues to Oxford’s Past and Present"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Students, community members explore city’s development and housing challenges through lecture and tour<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

What began as a fair housing law seminar for students in the University of Mississippi School of Law<\/strong> turned into a community lecture and tour discussing Oxford’s settlement, development and housing efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jade Craig<\/strong>, assistant professor of\u00a0law<\/a>, taught the class with a goal of bringing the community into the classroom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
Jade Craig. Photo by Srijita Chattopadhyay\/Ole Miss Digital Imaging Services<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“I wanted to engage in a conversation and really educate students more about the role of fair housing law in our own communities, in order to establish that fair housing law is a challenge that surrounds all of us, and that fair housing law has a role to play in the way we shape the community in which we live,” Craig said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“And so, I wanted to give a tour of Oxford<\/strong> from a fair housing perspective that explained residential segregation, living patterns and migration patterns, and how our town came to be organized the way it is, socially and demographically.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enter local historian and law school librarian Rhondalyn Peairs, who shared her expertise with students and community members in a contextual lecture and physical bus tour around town. The university’s\u00a0Center for Community Engagement<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0and the law school partnered to support the community events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Derived from land sold by Hoka<\/strong>, a Chickasaw Indian woman, Oxford and Lafayette County<\/strong> have become a micropolitan statistical area, which is an urban cluster of 10,000 to 50,000 people that is connected to other surrounding counties that have a commuting bond such as social or economic ties, Peairs said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Oxford and Lafayette County are really good case studies for development, change, settlement patterns, demographics and the fact that our rental and our homeownership base is challenged by having so many people here,” she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Students influence rental prices in the community, and retirees affect housing, since Oxford is considered a top-tier retirement community, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anna Claire Carter,<\/strong> a sophomore from Jonesboro<\/strong>, Arkansas<\/strong>, majoring in Southern studies and minoring in community engaged leadership and political science, attended the tour to learn about the history of housing in Oxford and the people who shaped it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I was particularly fascinated with the history of Molly Barr<\/strong> and her legacy as a Black female landowner,” Carter said. “The tour connected place names with historical meaning, deepening my understanding of Oxford as a place beyond the university.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
Rhondalyn Peairs (center right), an Oxford historian and librarian at the University of Mississippi School of Law, leads community members and Ole Miss law students on a tour in front of Oxford Intermediate School. The tour focused on Oxford’s history and development, including settlement patterns and demographics. Photo by Hunt Mercier\/Ole Miss Digital Imaging Services<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Stephen DuBravac<\/strong>, a second-year law student from\u00a0Mount Juliet, Tennessee<\/strong>, and Pleasant Grove, Utah<\/strong>, enrolled in the class after taking Craig’s real estate law class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I originally thought that fair housing law would be about affordable housing, which is a reason I was super excited,” DuBravac said. “However, I quickly came to learn that fair housing has to do with discrimination in housing and not affordability.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fair housing concerns people having an equal opportunity to purchase a home or to get a fair rental price without regard to religion, race, class or other factors that make up a person’s identity. Housing is considered affordable if a person pays less than 30% of his or her gross income on housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RaNetra Hamilton<\/strong>, a second-year law student from Indianapolis<\/strong>, took the class because of her familiarity\u00a0with fair housing\u00a0law and her previous\u00a0participation with the\u00a0law school’s housing clinic<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
RaNetra Hamilton. Submitted photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

“The most interesting thing I learned was about the creation of Oxford and its makeup,” Hamilton said. “Seeing the laws that I’ve learned so much about throughout law school and how they look in Oxford was an informative experience.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, discrimination persists in housing, DuBravac said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I learned this through participating in a paired test where I went into an apartment complex as a prospective renter as a white male and was shown an apartment,” he said. “Later that day when the other tester, who was a Black male, went in and was not shown an apartment even though he asked to see one and talked to the same property managers that I had.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The initial community lecture on March 25 provided context about Oxford while the tour visited Price Hill and Price Hill Park<\/strong> along West Jackson Avenue<\/strong>, C.B. Webb Townhomes and Community Green<\/strong> subdivision along Molly Barr Road, Freedmen Town<\/strong> between Price Street<\/strong> and West Jackson Avenue<\/strong>, and Wayne Johnson Estates<\/strong>, Rivers Hill <\/strong>and Belle Rivers<\/strong> off South 18th Street<\/strong> and University Avenue<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We have had so much development and change over the last few decades that people don’t have any idea that Oxford actually started very, very small, barely reaching past the bounds of the Square,” Peairs said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As student and retiree populations have increased Oxford’s population, this class has increased prospective employment ideas for its students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hamilton wants to be more involved in the creation of policies concerning fair housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Being in this class has only made me think more about how policies need to change in order to receive the results that many of us desire,” she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DuBravac would like to eventually become a solo practitioner; Craig’s class has opened his eyes to the possibility of developing affordable housing as a career path.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We recently heard from an affordable housing developer named Stewart Rutledge who played a big part in the development of the Belle Rivers complex we saw on the tour,” DuBravac said. “He also went to Ole Miss law and said a law degree was a great degree to have to do what he does, so I have recently started considering affordable housing development as a career path.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I have lived with my wife in two different college towns and in both, finding affordable housing was nearly impossible, so affordable housing is becoming quite a passion of mine,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Marisa C. Atkinson<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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