The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

The Future of Fair Housing

• Table of Contents
• About the Commission
• Acknowledgements
• Executive Summary
  • Recommendations
• Introduction
• I. Housing Discrimination and Segregation Continue
• II. Fair Housing Enforcement at HUD is Failing
• III. Fair Housing Enforcement at the Justice Department is Weak
• IV. The Need for Strong Fair Housing Programs
• V. Fair Housing and the Foreclosure Crisis
• VI. Federal Housing Programs
• VII. Fair Housing Obligations of Federal Grantees
• VIII. Regionalism and Fair Housing Enforcement
• IX. The President's Fair Housing Council
• X. Fair Housing Education: A Missing Piece
• XI. The Necessity of Fair Housing Research
• XII. Conclusion

Appendices

• Appendix A: Emerging Fair Housing Issues
• Appendix B: International Disapproval of U.S. Fair Housing Policy
• Appendix C:
  • Letter to Congressional Leaders
  • Letter to U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson
• Appendix D: Commission Witnesses and Staff

Increase Funding for the FHIP program

Funding for the Fair Housing Initiatives Program must be increased. These new funds will allow a significant increase in the presence and effectiveness of a community-based program that can improve the public’s awareness about fair housing rights, develop partnerships with industry leaders in communities, support increased fair housing enforcement, and help build, or rebuild, diverse communities.

First year funding for a reformed FHIP program should be, at a minimum, $52 million. In order to create a strong presence in our nation’s communities, FHIP eventually should support full funding of private fair housing organizations to conduct enforcement activity in each of the 363 Metropolitan Statistical Areas, ^[165] at a cost of approximately $109 million per year.

Additional funding for national educational campaigns and local, regional and national enforcement projects should also increase. Overall, the projected appropriations for an expanded FHIP program over the next six years would increase significantly, including routine increases in the amount provided to organizations for enforcement, for education, and for national media campaigns. And in order to ensure that the fair housing issues in communities are approached holistically, fair housing groups should be permitted to secure funds for both education and enforcement in the same year.

Because disability-based complaints make up the largest percentage of the complaints filed, HUD should encourage fair housing organizations to develop contractual partnerships with disability-based organizations on testing, education and enforcement strategies.

Next Section: Reform FHIP Management

Footnotes

[165] OMB Bulletin 08-01 (November 2007).