By Charlene Crowell
Despite getting slapped down by three courts over this summer, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) still plans to continue its efforts to hobble fair housing investigations and enforcement. In late August, a federal judge warned that Congress – not federal agencies – authorizes and appropriates funding for programs and operations.
Noting on August 26 that “HUD failed to make “a satisfactory explanation for its decision” Judge Myong J. Joun ruled, “It belies credulity to think that five awards alone could broaden and strengthen fair housing work across the nation, and excluding almost all existing fair housing organizations will certainly not strengthen fair housing work. I cannot ignore this disconnect.”
Judge Joun’s ruling rejected HUD’s attempt to limit grant criteria to only organizations with annual budgets of $5 million or more. That move would have had the effect of shrinking over 100 fair housing organizations to only five nationwide.
In March 2025, a court ordered HUD to reinstate Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) grants it had terminated for more than 60 organizations. Later in June, yet another court ruled HUD must administer appropriated FHIP funds when the agency refused to disburse FHIP funds for the 2024 fiscal year.
“When someone is wrongfully turned away from a housing opportunity because they have experienced domestic violence, because of a disability, their gender, or the color of their skin, they don’t call Washington,”, said Lisa Rice, President and CEO of the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA) reacting to the decision. “They call the fair housing organization in their community. HUD tried to shut the doors of the frontline groups who fight housing injustice and today a federal court emphatically said ‘no.’”
Rice and other housing advocates still worry that this recent courtroom victory will be short-lived, as it only affects funding appropriated through the end of the current fiscal year, September 30.
For the new fiscal year that begins October first, HUD has already made clear its intent to resume efforts to further diminish fair housing funding. Its budget request of $68 million for Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO) would continue recent fair housing cuts, this time by 21 percent. In 2024, Congress provided $86 million to fund FHEO, far below the $153 million needed to fully staff the division. As a result, FHEO now has only a third of the staff it had on January 20, 2025.
Two other fair housing programs targeted for cuts are the Private Enforcement Initiative, which pays for the investigations and testing that prove discrimination happened, and the Education and Outreach Initiative, that funds efforts to ensure people know they have rights in the first place.
These and other regressive actions will continue to be legally challenged by NFHA and its consortium of more than 290 private, nonprofit fair housing organizations; state and local civil rights agencies; and individuals throughout the United States. As it works to ensure every neighborhood has the resources people need to thrive and expand equitable housing opportunities for all people and communities, the organization also analyzes housing trends.
For example, NFHA’s most recent analysis of fair housing trends found that in 2024:
- From 2023 to 2024, housing discrimination complaints based on color increased 26.2 percent.
- Nationwide, 32,321 housing discrimination complaints were filed one of the highest figures in more than two decades.
- Nearly 75 percent of all housing discrimination complaints were investigated and filed by community-based local fair housing agencies.
- 83.56 percent of the year’s complaints were rental related.
As only 44.7 percent of Blacks owned their homes in 2024, Black families are more likely to become rental victims of racial housing discrimination.
The irony of these and other still unfolding events is that the agency designated to enforce the nation’s fair housing law is clearly demonstrating its determination to roll back over 60 years of hard-won civil rights.
NFHA’s analysis aptly summarizes why the fight for fair housing must continue:
“In the U.S., place is inextricably linked to opportunity: where we live determines our access to fresh air, clean water, well-resourced schools, healthcare facilities, reliable transportation, good jobs, quality internet service, and much more. Meanwhile, too many people are stuck in places that impede— rather than promote—their ability to thrive. Millions of Americans struggle under the weight of excessive housing costs, a dearth of affordable housing supply, and a lack of resources and amenities in the communities where they live.”