2006 NS Contract - Contract Conducting Analysis of Impediments Fair Housing Choice Donald B Eager & Assoc

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*o City of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio 25 ®. Anal sis of Im ediments to Fair Housin Choice Because housing is an integral part to the successful community care for many people with mental disabilities, discrimination has been a major barrier of access to adequate housing. In an effort to eliminate such discrimination and to support the right of people with a disability to live in the community of their choice, Congress included in the FHAA prohibitions against discrimination of persons with a mental disability in the provision of housing. In addition, it also prohibited discrimination of families with children. The provisions of the act also establish stronger administrative enforcement mechanisms and provide for stiffer penalties to expand coverage to include these specific classes in addition to those protected classes initially covered. In addition, there are special rules applicable to senior complexes and the advertising for such senior complexes. The FHAA provides that housing for older persons includes three categories of housing: (1) housing provided under a state or federal program that HUD determines is "specifically designed and operated to assist elderly persons "; (2) housing intended for and only occupied by persons who are 62 or older; and (3) housing "intended and operated for occupancy by at least one person 55 years of age or older per unit," which means that the housing must have at least 80 percent of its units occupied by at least one person 55 years of age or older, must have facilities and services designed to meet the needs of older persons and must adhere to the policies and procedures that demonstrate an intent to provide housing for persons 55 or older. The FHAA also provided for certain "transition" rules for existing complexes. Although the FHAA does not address the issue of advertising for senior complexes, the HUD regulations make clear that there is a parallel exemption from the discriminatory advertising provisions. Therefore, advertising forqualified "housing for older persons" under the FHAA may make reference to the age of the desired residents. Advertising guidelines have been the subject of great debate since they were enacted in 1988. In order to clarify the confusion over terms and phrases that were considered a violation of the regulations, the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) agency issued further guidelines that provide a more reasonable review method in orderto determine what constitutes discriminatory advertising. Originally, terms such as excellent view", walk -in closet", bachelor or bachelorette an names such as "The Baptist Home" could have been viewed as discriminatory. Currently, when these are placed in their proper context, they are not "red - flagged" as discriminatory. Besides words indicative of race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial status, or national origin, colloquialisms, or words or phrases used regionally or locally, which might imply or suggest race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial status or national origin should be avoided as well. In addition, catch words and phrases such as "restricted ", "exclusive ", "private ", "integrated ", "traditional ", "board approval' or "membership approval' and symbols or logotypes which imply or suggest race, color, religion, sex, disability, familial status or national origin should also be avoided.