HUD Commemorates April as National Fair Housing Month

 

Adrianne Todman, Acting Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), released the following statement in commemoration of Fair Housing Month and the signing of the Fair Housing Act of 1968, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex (including sexual orientation and gender identity), disability, and familial status. “For more than half a century, the federal government has sought to end discrimination in housing through enforcement of the Fair Housing Act. Under the Biden-Harris Administration, the Department of Housing and Urban Development takes its responsibilities under that law and other civil rights laws very seriously and works diligently to ensure people have full access to housing that meets their needs,” said HUD Acting Secretary Adrianne Todman. “Everyone in this country deserves to live free from discrimination, bias, and danger. This Fair Housing Month, we are recommitting ourselves to the important work of protecting individuals and families across America from harm.” This year’s Fair Housing Month theme, Fair Housing: The ‘Act’ in Action, underscores the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to combating discrimination in housing, protecting fair housing rights for all who call America home, and redressing our nation’s past discriminatory policies and practices. "This April, we reflect on the hard-fought battle for fair housing and recommit efforts to eliminate discrimination and disparities in housing across our country” said Demetria L. McCain, Principal Deputy Secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity. “This month and every month, HUD is taking meaningful action to advance housing justice and protect the rights of all people to live free from discrimination in the homes of their choice, regardless of their race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including sexual orientation or gender identity), disability, or familial status.” Each April, HUD recognizes Fair Housing Month alongside communities, fair housing advocates, and fair housing organizations to underscore the significance of the Fair Housing Act, raise public awareness of fair housing rights and responsibilities, highlight fair housing enforcement efforts, and emphasize the importance of creating diverse and inclusive communities. HUD will commemorate Fair Housing Month with an Opening Ceremony on April 11, 2024, at 2:00 P.M. (EDT), that will showcase HUD’s efforts to advance and protect fair housing rights to ensure that all people have the right to obtain the housing of their choice, free from discrimination. Register to attend the Fair Housing Month Opening Ceremony here. There is no cost to register. For a complete listing of HUD Fair Housing Month events and activities, visit: https://www.hud.gov/FHM. Follow the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity on Facebook for additional news and updates. People who believe they have experienced discrimination may file a complaint by contacting HUD's Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity at (800) 669-9777 (voice) or (800) 877-8339 (Relay). Housing discrimination complaints may also be filed by going to hud.gov/fairhousing. For additional information including educational materials for residents, housing providers and others, visit https://www.hud.gov/fairhousing.

HUD Launches Website to Combat Source of Income Discrimination for Families Using Housing Vouchers

HUD’s new website details protections against Source of Income (SOI) discrimination for families with Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs). SOI discrimination is the practice where landlords, owners, and real estate brokers refuse to rent to current or prospective qualified tenants with an HCV or other forms of public assistance. The Source of Income Protections website serves as a “one-stop shop” for HUD stakeholders that summarizes existing materials to explain what SOI discrimination looks like, identifies states and local jurisdictions that prohibit it, and provides resources for people who believe they have experienced this form of discrimination.

“Denying housing to Veterans, families with young children, or people trying to get off the street just because they get help to pay their rent preserves the legacy of discrimination, especially during this affordable housing crisis,” said Secretary Marcia L. Fudge. “Source of Income protections are important for families to thrive regardless of their economic status.”

HUD launches this resource in alignment with the principles laid out in the Biden-Harris Administration’s Blueprint for a Renter’s Bill of Rights, and at a time where lower income families face tremendous challenges finding safe, quality, and affordable housing. Leveraging all its resources, HUD is dedicated to ensuring that families with Housing Choice Vouchers (HCVs) have access to the housing and neighborhoods of their choice.

“There is no reason that those with vouchers should face discriminatory barriers that hinder or halt their housing search. This experience is still all too common for renters, despite having Source of Income protections in many states and jurisdictions. In order to address this issue, it is important to work with stakeholders to eliminate those practices," said Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, Richard J. Monocchio. "HUD’s new webpage provides useful information to everyone -- tenants, landlords, housing authorities, and others -- with the ultimate goal of improving tenants' leasing success.”

SOI discrimination can, and often does, include other policies or practices that impact a potential renter’s ability to attain housing using vouchers. In states and jurisdictions covered by existing SOI protections, refusal to accept vouchers and other public assistance to pay rent, or adding additional requirements, can constitute as a form of housing discrimination. Thus, enforcing these protections is a critical component to ensuring people have fair access to the rental market.

“There is growing evidence that state and local laws prohibiting Source of Income discrimination improve voucher utilization rates for public housing authorities and expand housing and neighborhood choices for voucher holders,” said Solomon Greene, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for HUD’s Office of Policy Development and Research. “As part of our role at HUD, we believe it is imperative to support evidence-based policies that advance HUD’s mission to create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all.”

Local and state organizations may enforce illegal SOI discrimination and conduct fair housing testing to root it out. “Fair housing testing is an indispensable investigative tool to root out housing discrimination and FHEO encourages testing activities designed to identify discrimination that violates the Fair Housing Act,” said Demeteria McCain, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity. “As I made clear in my February 2024 memo, Fair Housing Assistance Program (FHAP) recipients may use HUD funds to design source of income discrimination testing projects to detect discrimination that may violate the Fair Housing Act or state or local laws.”ent, all remaining residents who still need to be moved into supported housing will be.

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Read the March 13, 2024 HUD press release.

State Presents Workforce Diversity Presentation on April 17th

 

Join the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights & Kennedy Krieger Institute as we discuss neurodiversity, building an inclusive workforce, and breaking down barriers to employment. To register, click on the picture above or click HERE.   Victim of Discrimination? Training & Partnerships HOME      ABOUT MCCR      SERVICES      PUBLICATIONS      EVENTS      PRESS      CONTACT US

 

Study Confirms Maryland Has Shortage of Affordable Housing Units

 

The just-released The Gap: A Shortage of Affordable Homes study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC) has found that across Maryland, there is a shortage of rental homes affordable and available to extremely low income households, whose incomes are at or below the poverty guideline or 30% of their area median income. Many of these households are severely cost burdened, and spend over half of their income on housing. Severely cost burdened poor households are more likely than other renters to sacrifice other necessities like healthy food and healthcare to pay the rent, and to have unstable housing situations like evictions. 

"Cost Burden" is defined as spending more than 30% of household income on housing costs. "Severe Cost Burden" is spending more than 50% of household income on housing costs.

According to the NLIHC study, historic drivers of housing inequity include: 

• Decades of racial discrimination by real estate agents, banks, insurers, and the federal government have made homeownership difficult to obtain for people of color. 
• Many factors kept people of color (POC) from being able to purchase homes through the 1950s: the pervasive refusal of whites to live in racially integrated neighborhoods, physical violence targeting POC who tried to integrate (which was often tolerated by police), restrictive covenants outlawing home sales to Black buyers to integrate neighborhoods, and federal housing policy that denied borrowers access to credit in minority neighborhoods (Massey & Denton, 1993; Coates, 2014; Rothstein, 2017). 
• Being denied the ability to purchase homes meant that POC did not benefit from the appreciation in home value, a major driver of the racial wealth gap. 
• While overt discrimination was outlawed by the Fair Housing Act of 1968, subtler forms of housing discrimination continue. HUD’s fair housing tests in 28 metropolitan areas found that Black homebuyers were shown 17.7% fewer homes than similar white homebuyers (HUD, 2013). 
• More recent fair housing investigations show similar discrimination, including being shown fewer homes and not being given the same information as white buyers (Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights, 2018; Choi, Herbert, Winslow, & Browne, 2019). 
• Today’s credit scoring system and lending practices also are barriers to POC homeownership (Rice & Swesnik, 2012; Bartlett et al., 2019).

Other Key national findings of the NLIHC's study are:

• The shortage of affordable rental housing primarily impacts renters with extremely low incomes.  Extremely low-income renters in the U.S. face a shortage of 7.3 million affordable, available rental homes, resulting in only 34 affordable, available homes for every 100 extremely low-income renter households.

• The shortage of affordable rental housing is more acute than before the pandemic. Between 2019 and 2022, the shortage of affordable and available rental homes for extremely low-income renters increased by more than 480,000.

• Black, Latino, and Indigenous households are disproportionately extremely low-income renters and disproportionately impacted by this shortage. Some 19% of Black non-Latino households, 16% of American Indian or Alaska Native households, and 13% of Latino households are extremely low-income renters, compared to only 6% of white non-Latino households.

• Extremely low-income renters are more likely than other renters to spend a large part of their income on rent. A total of 87% are cost-burdened with 74% are severely cost-burdened. Extremely low-income renters are almost a quarter of all renters, but 44% of all cost-burdened renters and 69% of severely cost-burdened renters.

Regarding Maryland:

• 197,310 or 26% of Maryland renter households are extremely low income.
• The state has a shortage of 134,192 rental homes affordable and available for extremely low income renters.
• $37,740 is the average income limit for 4-person extremely low income household.
• $64,642 is the annual household income needed to afford a two-bedroom rental home at HUD's Fair Market Rent.
• 73% of extremely low income renter households have a severe cost burden.

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Read the NLIHC study's Maryland profile.

Maryland Fair Housing Forum is on April 18th

 

Join us at our Fair Housing Forum that bring communities together to discuss fair housing issues and antidiscrimination efforts. To register, click on the picture above or click HERE.   Victim of Discrimination? Training & Partnerships HOME      ABOUT MCCR      SERVICES      PUBLICATIONS      EVENTS      PRESS      CONTACT US

 

April is National Fair Housing Month! Opening Ceremony is April 11th.

 

This April, HUD is commemorating the 56th anniversary of the Fair Housing Act, the landmark civil rights law signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson on April 11, 1968, that made discrimination in housing transactions unlawful. The theme of this year’s Fair Housing Month is "Fair Housing: The ‘Act’ in Action."

Please join us virtually on Thursday, April 11, 2024, at 2:00 P.M. (EDT) for this year’s Fair Housing Month Opening Ceremony, hosted by the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO). Please sign up to attend here.

This virtual event will highlight HUD’s progress toward protecting and expanding fair housing rights for all. Our program will include remarks from the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for FHEO, Demetria McCain; the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy, Legislative Initiatives, and Outreach, Melody Taylor; and the President and CEO of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Damon Hewitt.

For additional information, visit the Fair Housing Month 2024 Website or follow us on X and Facebook. 

FHEO Technical Assistance 

• HUD and FHEO are continuously developing technical assistance materials, resources, and trainings to educate housing consumers and providers on their fair housing rights and responsibilities. You can view all HUD training opportunities here.

During Fair Housing Month 2024, FHEO is highlighting its efforts to provide fair housing education to our stakeholders. Click the links below to view these recently developed technical assistance resources:

• Assistance Animals and Fair Housing: Navigating Reasonable Accommodations Webinar
• Data and Fair Housing Planning: AFFH-T Video Series
• Fair Housing Act’s Familial Status Protections Webinar
• OHC and FHEO Conference - Fair Housing 2021: What Counselors Need to Know
• Preventing Sexual and Other Discriminatory Harassment in Housing
• Respondent’s Obligations Toolkit
• LGBTQIA+ Fair Housing Toolkit

HUD FHEO Talk Talks Series

The FHEO Talk Talks Series provides the Agency with the opportunity to strengthen its partnerships with leading community stakeholders and inform HUD’s mission to ensure fair housing for all.

The series was developed in accordance with President Biden’s Executive Order on Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities through the Federal Government. It covers topics related to fair housing and racial equity and includes discussions with experts, practitioners, leaders, and social justice activists engaged in work relevant to fair housing opportunities. To learn more or view previously recorded episodes of the FHEO Table Talks Series, please visit HUD’s YouTube channel.

HUD proudly remains committed to expanding and protecting fair housing rights for future generations to come. We hope you will join us to make our progress towards achieving housing equity for all who call America home. 

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Source: HUD email, March 19, 2024.

Urge Your Maryland Senator to Vote Yes on SB57 to Support Fair Housing

SB57 has passed through second reader! This bill would carve a narrow exemption in two party consent law to allow fair housing testers to record their testing interactions in accordance with the Federal Department of Housing and Urban Development's testing recommendations.   

39 other states allow one-party recordings for fair housing testing. All of the states that have had large fair housing court settlements have relied on recordings. SB57 will strengthen Maryland’s ability to enforce its fair housing laws. SB57 is on its third and final reader in the Senate TODAY. Take one minute to contact your senator and ask them to vote YES on SB57.

Click HERE to urge your State Senator to support SB57!
 

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Source: Economic Action Maryland email, March 18, 2024.