• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • About
  • Press Room
  • Poverty & Race Journal
  • Donate
  • Publications
    • PRRAC Publications & PRRAC Authors
    • PRRAC Policy Briefs
    • PRRAC Advocacy Resources
  • Events
  • Contact

PRRAC — Connecting Research to Advocacy

Poverty & Race Research Action Council

MENUMENU
  • Fair Housing
    • Fair Housing Homepage
    • Federal Housing Advocacy – by Program
    • Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH)
    • Housing Mobility (Section 8)
    • Low Income Housing Tax Credit
    • Fair Housing and Community Development
  • School Diversity
  • Environmental Justice
  • Special Projects
    • Civil Rights History
    • Civil Rights & The Administrative State
    • Housing-School Nexus
    • International Human Rights and U.S. Civil Rights Policy
    • One Nation Indivisible: School Diversity, Immigrant Integration, and Multi-Racial Coalitions
    • PRRAC in the Courts
    • Alliance Housing Justice
  • Search
    • Search

You are here: Home / Browse PRRAC Content / PRRAC Update / PRRAC Update (February 23, 2012): HOME, CERD, and Magnet Schools

PRRAC Update (February 23, 2012): HOME, CERD, and Magnet Schools

February 23, 2012 by

New rules for HUD’s HOME program:  PRRAC submitted comments last week on proposed new rules for the HOME Investment Partnerships Program, described by HUD as “the largest federal block grant to the States and local governments that is designed exclusively to create affordable housing for low-income households.”  PRRAC’s comments supported the expanded affirmative marketing provisions in the rule, but raised concerns about unintended discriminatory consequences of certain proposed tenant selection provisions.  We also supported the Center on Budget & Policy Priorities’ comments, which argue for more explicit discrimination protections for Section 8 voucher holders applying to HOME funded properties.

CERD Treaty raised in Affordable Care Act amicus brief:  PRRAC joined the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and other groups in an amicus brief to the U.S. Supreme Court on the “Medicaid Expansion Provision” portion of the challenge to the Obama health care law currently before the U.S. Supreme Court.  The amicus brief, drafted by Martha Davis of Northeastern Law School and Risa Kaufman with the Columbia Law School Human Rights Clinic, argues that the Medicaid Expansion Provision, by seeking to mitigate racial disparities in access to health care, is responsive to U.S. treaty obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.  The brief cites the U.N. CERD Committee’s 2008 “Concluding Observations” on health care disparities in the U.S., which echo PRRAC’s coalition shadow report submitted to the Committee earlier that year.  Davis and Kaufman also point out that, since its passage, U.S. officials have repeatedly cited the Affordable Care Act to the U.N. as evidence of U.S. efforts to reduce disparities in access to health care.

 Other news and resources

More children living in concentrated poverty:  The KIDS COUNT Data Snapshot  from the Annie E. Casey Foundation was released today.  The snapshot reveals that nearly 8 million children live in areas of concentrated poverty, places where at least 30 percent of residents have an annual income below the federal poverty level – about $22,000 for a family of four. This represents a 25 percent increase, or about 1.6 million more children, since 2000.   In addition to the national picture, the snapshot provides data on children in high-poverty areas by state and for the 50 largest cities in the country – and indicates that children in the south and southwest, as well as those in urban and rural areas, are more likely to live in such poor communities. African-American, American Indian, and Latino children are six to nine times more likely to be found in them than their white counterparts.  This analysis is, unfortunately, consistent with other recent research released by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies and supported by PRRAC.

The Shrinking Supply of Affordable Housing:  The National Low Income Housing Coalition’s new Housing Spotlight report also provides alarming detail on the growing gap between housing need and rental housing supply for “extremely low income families” (families below 30% of median area income).

“Reviving Magnet Schools: Strengthening a Successful Choice Option”:  For more optimistic news, see the Civil Rights Project’s latest policy brief, by Genevieve Siegel-Hawley and Erica Frankenberg, which found that magnet schools funded in the 2010-2013 federal funding cycle reported more inclusive admissions processes, a resurgence of interest in pursuing racially diverse enrollments and an increased willingness to allow out-of-district students to attend magnet programs.  The policy brief also shows high levels of demand for magnet schools.

 

Filed Under: PRRAC Update

Primary Sidebar

PRRAC Updates

PRRAC Update (April 5, 2021): Social Housing and HUD

PRRAC Update (March 18, 2021): New Issue of Poverty & Race

PRRAC Update (March 4, 2021): Magnet Schools and Public Housing Redevelopment

Previous Updates...

PRRAC in the News

America’s Racist Housing Rules Really Can Be Fixed (Vox)

February 17, 2021

Billions in School Construction in CT Hasn’t Made a Dent in Segregation — But This Year, Things Could Be Different (Connecticut Mirror)

January 4, 2021

Education Dept. Gets $73.5 Billion in Funding Deal That Ends Ban on Federal Aid for Busing (Education Week)

December 22, 2020

Massachusetts’ Public Schools are Highly Segregated. It’s Time We Treated That Like the Crisis It Is (Boston Globe)

December 11, 2020

Previous Posts...

PRRAC on Twitter

Tweets by @PRRAC_DC

Poverty & Race Journal

Footer

PRRAC – Poverty & Race Research Action Council

The Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC) is a civil rights law and policy organization based in Washington, D.C. Our mission is to promote research-based advocacy strategies to address structural inequality and disrupt the systems that disadvantage low-income people of color. PRRAC was founded in 1989, through an initiative of major civil rights, civil liberties, and anti-poverty groups seeking to connect advocates with social scientists working at the intersection of race and poverty…Read More

Archives

Resources at PRRAC

  • Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing
  • Environmental Justice
  • Fair Housing
  • Fair Housing & Community Development
  • Low Income Housing Tax Credit
  • Poverty & Race Journal
  • PRRAC Update
  • School Diversity
  • Housing Choice Voucher Mobility
  • PRRAC in The Courts

Copyright © 2021 · Magazine Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in var _ctct_m = "7608c7e98e90af7d6ba8b5fd4d901424"; //static.ctctcdn.com/js/signup-form-widget/current/signup-form-widget.min.js

PRRAC — Connecting Research to Advocacy

  • Fair Housing
    • Fair Housing Homepage
    • Federal Housing Advocacy – by Program
    • Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH)
    • Housing Mobility (Section 8)
    • Low Income Housing Tax Credit
    • Fair Housing and Community Development
  • School Diversity
  • Environmental Justice
  • Special Projects
    • Civil Rights History
    • Civil Rights & The Administrative State
    • Housing-School Nexus
    • International Human Rights and U.S. Civil Rights Policy
    • One Nation Indivisible: School Diversity, Immigrant Integration, and Multi-Racial Coalitions
    • PRRAC in the Courts
    • Alliance Housing Justice
  • Search
  • About
  • Press Room
  • Poverty & Race Journal
  • Donate
  • Publications
    • PRRAC Publications & PRRAC Authors
    • PRRAC Policy Briefs
    • PRRAC Advocacy Resources
  • Events
  • Contact