Previous provisions to enforce the 1968 Fair Housing Act’s requirement to “affirmatively further fair housing” were essentially toothless, according to multiple past assessments by a bipartisan commission, the Government Accountability Office and HUD. Before the 2015 rule, jurisdictions would self-certify their compliance every few years, and their analyses of their efforts to assess and address fair housing concerns — if performed at all — were not reviewed by HUD, according to a 2018 lawsuit that fair housing advocates had filed against Carson and the agency after Trump officials suspended the rule. Last July, the Trump administration replaced it with a weakened version that civil rights advocates said no longer compelled recipients of HUD dollars to address housing discrimination and the effects of segregation.

Source: Washington Post June 09, 2021 10:00 UTC