Platform - Green Party US
II. Social Justice
J. Housing and Homelessness
Fair Housing
The Green Party recommends the following actions:
Fair Housing
Enforce and strengthen the federal Fair Housing Act and other federal and state fair-housing laws that prohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability, familial status and national origin.
Increase funding to assist people who believe they have been victims of housing discrimination and support and fund fair housing enforcement and education across the nation.
Consider establishment of an independent Fair Housing Enforcement Agency outside of the U.S.
Department of Housing and Urban Development in order to improve enforcement and restore public confidence in the implementation of federal fair housing policies.
Require that communities that receive federal housing funds provide evidence that their housing policies are affirmatively furthering fair housing.
Amend the federal Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program to increase access of eligible families to high opportunity communities, by including higher rents where necessary, improving administrative portability of vouchers across jurisdictional lines, re-establishing housing mobility programs to assist voucher-holders seeking to move to higher opportunity areas, creating strong incentives and performance goals for administering agencies, and providing incentives to recruit new landlords into the program.
Amend the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program to include fair housing requirements for site selection, affirmative marketing, and reporting of racial/ ethnic data to ensure that this program works to further fair housing goals.
Ensure that fair housing principles are emphasized in programs addressing the mortgage and financial crisis.
Revive the President's Fair Housing Council to coordinate federal activities across agencies to support fair housing.