Since its opening in 1975, Starrett City had filled vacancies under an affirmative action racial formula in which 70% of vacant apartments went to non-Hispanic white families, and the remaining 30% went to minority families. In 1977, the minority makeup was 19% black, 9% Hispanic, and 2% Asian. By 1979, the proportion of white residents had declined to 64%. At the time, most of the advertisements for Starrett City featured white applicants, but much of the resulting applicant pool was black or Hispanic. As a result of the quotas, black applicants who wanted apartments in Starrett City waited almost eight times as long as white applicants. By 1983, the complex's 5,881 apartments were fully occupied, and three-fourths of the 6,000 families on Starrett City's waiting list were minorities.