Encouraging new housing choices: A new PRRAC research report, by Peter Rosenblatt and Jennifer Cossyleon at Loyola University-Chicago looks at the impacts of an innovative security deposit incentive program in Milwaukee County – “Take a Chance on Me”: A Review of the Milwaukee County Security Deposit Assistance Program. With assistance from the Metropolitan Milwaukee Fair Housing Council.
Incomplete LIHTC data: For many years, the Low Income Housing Tax Credit was the only federal housing program that lacked basic civil rights data. Then, in 2008, Congress required HUD to collect and report LIHTC occupancy data from the states. This week, more than six years later, HUD has finally released the first set of LIHTC data. As HUD notes in the report, there is much data still missing from the states, and funding that was designated to support the data collection was never appropriated. But more importantly, this initial data release does not include building level, neighborhood level, or metropolitan level data – all key indicators that would enable civil rights advocates to assess the extent of racial discrimination or segregation in the LIHTC program. We hope to work with HUD to ensure that the next data collection is more complete.
The day after the argument: Yesterday’s Supreme Court arguments in Inclusive Communities Project v. Texas Department of Community Affairs went to the heart of PRRAC’s housing and education work. Will disparate impact review in fair housing cases survive? For some of the best coverage of what’s at stake, see these articles in the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal. For a good review of the argument itself, see this short piece in Scotusblog, this morning’s NY Times editorial, or read the transcript here.
Other Resources
New stories from Housingmobility.org: Meet Elijah and Christina, children in the Dallas housing mobility program, and winners of the Inclusive Community Project’s 2014 school-based Opportunity Housing Photo Contest.
New book on school desegregation and resegregation from PRRAC Social Science Advisory Board member Roz Mickelson: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow: School Desegregation and Resegregation in Charlotte (Harvard Education Press)
