U.S. Housing Department Expanding Protections to Gay and Immigrant Communities

HUD releases 2010 Fair Housing Report showing improvement in resolving cases.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had an impactful year in 2010 tackling issues of housing discrimination for minorities, families with children and people with disabilities. It will improve upon its work by expanding outreach to LGBTQ and immigrant communities to protect them from housing discrimination.

HUD, the department responsible for insuring quality, affordable homes for all persons, just released its annual fair housing report for the fiscal year 2010. The report shows that the housing department is resolving individual housing discrimination complaints faster, launching more legal discrimination cases, and providing job opportunities to more than 16,000 residents and contracts to nearly 3,000 businesses in low-income areas receiving HUD-funding.

According to the report, more than 10,000 fair housing complaints were filed during the fiscal 2010 year. Of them, 48% alleged disability discrimination, 34% alleged race discrimination, and 15% alleged family status discrimination.

In tackling the overwhelming number of complaints, the report also shows that HUD and its Fair Housing Assistance Program partner agencies were able to process nearly 4,500 complaints within 100 days. The agency says that’s 328 more complaints processed than in 2009, and 583 more than in 2008.

In the press release, HUD assistant secretary for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity John Trasviña, said, “Our goal is to put an end to unlawful housing discrimination.” He added, “We have made progress in reducing housing discrimination, but more work needs to be done to make ‘fair housing…part of the American way of life.”

Going forward, the agency says they will continue to reach out to groups that have historically lacked sufficient protection from housing discrimination, such as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender persons.

New initiatives include revising the program’s regulations to include fair housing protection for LGBTQ couples and individuals, and also immigrant communities. Part of that effort will be expanding fair housing conferences and reaching out to advocacy organizations that work with LGBTQ and immigrants.