AFR joined our partners in a letter of support for the Housing Fairness Act of 2020.

The Housing Fairness Act authorizes increased program funding to better support existing qualified fair housing enforcement organizations, create new groups where they do not currently exist, and help fair housing organizations attract, train, and retain highly specialized fair housing experts to conduct testing and investigations. The bill also makes significant improvements in a number of program areas in order to streamline program implementation, make better use of grantee and HUD time and resources, and provide for coordinated systemic regional or national investigations to get at the heart of systemic discrimination. The bill also creates a separate grant program intended to support academic research into the nature, causes and outcomes of housing discrimination and residential segregation to support the need for stronger fair housing policy solutions. H.R. 149 also makes adjustments to FHIP eligibility requirements to ensure that organizations can concurrently apply for enforcement and education grants. The legislation also improves HUD reporting requirements to better quantify the impact of enforcement actions and public fair housing education. Finally, the legislation reinstates HUD’s 2015 Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule to restore accountability and compliance with the Fair Housing Act by local and state governments that receive federal housing and community development dollars.