Over the weekend, a federal judge ruled that an Obama-era rule suspended by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) under Secretary Ben Carson must go into effect on January 1, 2018. ThinkProgress reports:
The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) needs to implement an Obama-era rule on January 1, 2018 that enables low-income people to afford housing in high-opportunity areas with better schools, a federal judge ordered Saturday.
Under the leadership of Secretary Ben Carson, HUD announced in August it was delaying the rule for two years, saying the agency needed to further evaluate it. Several civil rights organizations — including the Legal Defense Fund — immediately filed a lawsuit against the agency’s decision. Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell ruled against HUD Saturday evening, saying it did not provide “notice and comment or particularized evidentiary findings” to substantiate delaying the rule.
This is the result of a lawsuit filed by organizations including the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund (LDF), The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and the Poverty and Race Research Action Council, who argued Carson’s proposed delay in implementing the Small Area Market Rent rule. The Atlantic explains:
The program, called Small Area Fair Market Rents, would have increased the amount of money the government would pay for voucher-holders to rent homes in high-opportunity areas, and lowered the amount they would receive in low-opportunity areas. The program, which would have gone into effect in 23 metropolitan areas, would theoretically not have cost HUD any more money, something that seemingly would have appealed to an administration purportedly hell-bent on cutting government costs.
This win is a big deal—and will be a much-needed boost for low-income families who use vouchers.
As a press release from the LDF states:
Our lawsuit is critical to ensure that HUD moves forward with this rule, which was designed to give families access to higher-opportunity neighborhoods and to break the cycle of concentrated poverty and segregation,” said Sherrilyn Ifill, President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. “HUD’s delay unnecessarily limits opportunity, not only for safe, secure and affordable housing, but also the opportunity to choose better schools, jobs and healthcare.”
Nerd out with the court documents linked below: