INTEGRATING PUBLIC HOUSING

* A 1987 Housing and Urban Development review found that Boston's system of placing public-housing applicants discriminated against minorities. HUD's review concluded that minorities were discouraged from living in East Boston, Charlestown, and South Boston.

Previously, the Boston Housing Authority (BHA) used housing project-based waiting lists, leaving tenants placed in projects based on where their race predominated.

HUD also found that the BHA was not offering applicants HUD's "open housing options" whereby applicants could opt to live in a housing project other than where their own race predominated. If applicants chose this option, they would get faster housing placement.

* In July 1988, Mayor Raymond Flynn, the BHA, and HUD worked out a compliance agreement to reform the system. The process now uses only one citywide list so applicants are placed in housing based on when they apply regardless of race.

* In the summer of 1988, Mr. Flynn met with residents to ease integration in South Boston when two black families moved there in July. More black families moved into other white housing projects in the next few months.

* In 1989, as a result of a lawsuit filed by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the city was required to provide monetary compensation to the minority tenants discriminated against before 1987.