Posted on 06/11/2015 5:12:49 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The Obama administration is moving forward with regulations designed to help diversify America’s wealthier neighborhoods, drawing fire from critics who decry the proposal as executive overreach in search of an “unrealistic utopia.”
A final Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) rule due out this month is aimed at ending decades of deep-rooted segregation around the country.
The regulations would use grant money as an incentive for communities to build affordable housing in more affluent areas while also taking steps to upgrade poorer areas with better schools, parks, libraries, grocery stores and transportation routes as part of a gentrification of those communities.
“HUD is working with communities across the country to fulfill the promise of equal opportunity for all,” a HUD spokeswoman said. “The proposed policy seeks to break down barriers to access to opportunity in communities supported by HUD funds.”
It’s a tough sell for some conservatives. Among them is Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), who argued that the administration “shouldn’t be holding hostage grant monies aimed at community improvement based on its unrealistic utopian ideas of what every community should resemble.”
“American citizens and communities should be free to choose where they would like to live and not be subject to federal neighborhood engineering at the behest of an overreaching federal government,” said Gosar, who is leading an effort in the House to block the regulations.
Civil rights advocates, meanwhile, are praising the plan, arguing that it is needed to break through decades-old barriers that keep poor and minority families trapped in hardscrabble neighborhoods.
“We have a history of putting affordable housing in poor communities,” said Debby Goldberg, vice president at the National Fair Housing Alliance.
The Fair Housing Act of 1968 prohibited direct and intentional housing discrimination, such as a real estate agent not showing a home in a wealthy neighborhood to a black family or a bank not providing a loan based on someone’s race.
But HUD is looking to root out more subtle forms of discrimination that take shape in local government policies that unintentionally harm minority communities, known as “disparate impact.”
“This rule is not about forcing anyone to live anywhere they don’t want to,” said Margery Turner, senior vice president at the left-leaning Urban Institute. “It’s really about addressing long-standing practices that prevent people from living where they want to.”
“In our country, decades of public policies and institutional practices have built deeply segregated and unequal neighborhoods,” Turner said.
Children growing up in poor communities have less of a chance of succeeding in life, because they face greater exposure to violence and crime, and less access to quality education and health facilities, Turner suggested.
“Segregation is clearly a problem that is blocking upward mobility for children growing up today,” she said.
To qualify for certain funds under the regulations, cities would be required to examine patterns of segregation in neighborhoods and develop plans to address it. Those that don’t could see the funds they use to improve blighted neighborhoods disappear, critics of the rule say.
The regulations would apply to roughly 1,250 local governments.
Hans von Spakovsky, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, called the Obama administration “too race conscious.”
“It’s a sign that this administration seems to take race into account on everything,” Spakovsky said.
Republicans are trying to block the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule. Before passing HUD’s funding bill this week, the GOP-led House approved Gosar’s amendment prohibiting the agency from following through with the rule.
Though segregationist policies were outlawed long ago, civil rights advocates say housing discrimination persists.
HUD is looking to break down many barriers, but Gosar suggested the regulation would have negative repercussions.
“Instead of living with neighbors you like and choose, this breaks up the core fabric of how we start to look at communities,” Gosar said. “That just brings unease to everyone in that area.”
“People have to feel comfortable where they live,” he added. “If I don’t feel comfortable in my own backyard, where do I feel comfortable?”
Critics of the rule say it would allow HUD to assert authority over local zoning laws. The agency could dictate what types of homes are built where and who can live in those homes, said Gosar, who believes local communities should make those decisions for themselves rather than relying on the federal government.
If enacted, the rule could depress property values as cheaper homes crop up in wealthy neighborhoods and raise taxes, Gosar warned.
It could also tilt the balance of political power as more minorities are funneled into Republican-leaning neighborhoods, he suggested.
The Supreme Court is expected to weigh in on housing discrimination in a related case in the coming weeks. At issue is whether government policies that unintentionally create a disparate impact for minority communities violate federal laws against segregation.
The Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs is facing accusations that it makes low-income housing funds more readily available in minority neighborhoods than in white neighborhoods. This promotes segregation, critics argue, by encouraging minorities to continue living in poor communities where government assistance is available.
Court observers say the case could have a profound impact on HUD’s rule.
This is part of his scorched earth policy for the next 18 months.
I sit on an advisory committee for capital improvement fund allocation in my little township. We met just two days ago, and one discussion was how it is not necessarily worth applying for and receiving grant money from the government to help fund projects. too many strings attached forever. so they can dangle that carrot, or threaten withholding funds, but it might not work. I’m sure we are not the first to figure this out.
The twp also has a very large apartment complex, which had a waiting list when it was built in the mid 90’s; it was THE place to live. A few years ago the complex decided to accept Section 8 tenants and has regretted it ever since. They draw more police visits than the whole rest of the township combined.
And so another agenda item being clicked off on his legacy.
He talked about doing this some years ago during a campaign stop.
I had gone over there and mentioned what about the gangs that are doing more killings in the urban areas.
Oregon is being threatenedby the Feds with a $140 million loss of educational funding over common core testing right now.We shall see what happens
Prediction:
This Mr. Obama stuff is going to backfire.
of course, the states really have the upper hand if they want it, since the money the feds threaten to withhold came from them anyway.
I sure wish a couple states would turn the tables on the fed and $$’s
We got one recently in our working class neighborhoods. Fortunately, we raised enough of a fuss about it that they decided to go ahead and build it with the restriction that it be limited to residents age 55 or older.
I think so too...
This will be, OF COURSE, targeted at “Swing” districts, to make sure they become permanently Democrat.
This has been done before.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/07/american-murder-mystery/306872/
Doesn’t end well.
A Saudi firm just bought a large consortium of apartment complexes, and there is one three miles from where I live slated for Hope'n'Change.
I personally think her comments are completely inappropriate, especially for a teacher. She could have scolded the intruders for not following the law and their parents for not teaching them to follow the law, but instead she hit below the belt.
So will we see any of this in those buildings rich leftists in NYC live in too?
Is that ever true! We live in an HOA where we pay dues and have by-laws. When the economy tanked soon after Obama took office, people needing to move couldn't sell their houses promptly, so the Board eventually allowed renting. The helpful Democrat government soon placed a bunch of Section 8's into several of those houses.
Immediately, we had teen boys jumping over decks and looking in people's houses (one almost got himself shot doing that), broken glass on the streets, trash put out in unsecured bags blowing all over neighbor's gardens and attracting vermin, alcohol bottles and trash thrown into the forest preserve, thumper cars at all hours, speeding heedless of children or pedestrians, loud parties and illegal businesses in the homes, bringing unwanted traffic. Our dues have been quadrupled to pay for a "security service" and a dog-mess cleaner, since even suburban renters won't scoop, even though we have a dog park and several poo-baggie stations. And don't get me started on the state of the upkeep of those houses, which should be on the absentee owners. Those dues that were intended for improvements to the infrastructure are now a form of welfare taxation.
Nobody responsible even wants to serve on the Board any more, since any attempt at restricting behavior to the by-laws brings a raft of accusations of racism. You can't even complain if the meetings take place without notice, since the property manager is now a person of color.
Once old folks died off and their children sold their homes, we had the same situation.
It was never exclusive there, but those old Hungarian ladies kept their lawns and gardens like a picture. Nothing was new or fancy, but it was all tidy, well kept and immaculate.
Once we got the first minority family (and I MEAN the next day) three cars on our street had batteries stolen and lawn furniture shoved RITHT UP to the windows overnight.
It went down hill from there. That property was worthless by the time my parents moved out.
I am aware of what it is.
We had that issue too. In our case we ran for office and just took control of the HOA. Problem solved! (And community greatly improved!)
Bears repeating.
I was thinking something similar this morning as I read this article. A certain minority population seems to believe that "White" people are born with some sort of magic bean that gives them all kinds of privleges. The reality is that the way you live your life is the difference.
Get married, stay married, have children with your marriage partner, raise them together. This is the main divide. Yes, education and/or training is a great thing to do as well; but, a stable personal evironment makes one's life better.
They want what we have; but, refuse to do the things that will make that life possible. Just living next to my family is not going to do it.
I read, in one of the articles posted on this McKinney pool party mayhem, that the *event* hostess (in the park NEXT to the pool) and her mom are recent Chicago transplants.
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