Representative Maxine Waters (D-CA), the ranking member of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Financial Services, sent a letter to President Biden urging the immediate release and implementation of the final “Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing” (AFFH) rule in order to “fulfil the Democratic commitment to fair housing for all and prevent exacerbating our nation’s worsening affordable housing and homelessness crisis.”
In the letter, Ranking Member Waters cites the President’s commitment and previous actions to support fair housing and racial equity, as well as her request in 2020 to then-President Elect Biden. The letter states that “AFFH has gone largely unenforced since the passage of the FHAct [Fair Housing Act]. The Obama administration sought to turn that tide in 2015 by finalizing a historic rule. Unfortunately, the timing of the implementation of the 2015 rule was left to the Trump Administration, which later overturned the final rule, a decision that was widely criticized and litigated by civil rights and affordable housing advocates. It is critical to avoid similar threats to HUD’s final AFFH rule by publishing and implementing the regulation as soon as possible.”
The proposed AFFH rule was announced in January 2023, and advocates largely supported the rule. Ranking Member Waters’s call comes after nearly 300 organizations sent a similar letter to the White House imploring the administration to “follow through on its commitments and release the final AFFH rule as soon as possible so that more communities can have affordable and accessible housing options” that impact all areas of their lives (see Memo 4/22).
Read the press statement and the letter here.