Analysis of Impediments 2003
City of Bowling Green, Ohio

Report prepared by the Toledo Fair Housing Center

INTRODUCTION
CURRENT STATE OF FAIR HOUSING & ASSESSMENT OF FAIR HOUSING PROGRAMS
DEMOGRAPHIC DATA
RACIAL CHARACTERISTICS
POPULATION CHANGE
POVERTY RATES
AGING AND HOUSEHOLD DEMOGRAPHICS
HOUSING FOR THE ELDERLY
FAMILY HOUSEHOLD ISSUES
ECONOMIC CLIMATE & SERVICES AND AMENITIES
INCOME DATA
HOUSING PROFILE
HOME OWNERSHIP RATES
REAL ESTATE HOUSING PRACTICES
MORTGAGE LENDING ISSUES
SUBSIDIZED AND ASSISTED HOUSING
DISABILITY ISSUES
NATIONAL ORIGIN ISSUES
ZONING ISSUES
RECOMMENDATIONS

INTRODUCTION

Since 1968, the Department of Housing and Urban Development has been under Congressional mandate to affirmatively further fair housing and to ensure that entitlement and other jurisdictions who receive federal funding, and in particular, Community Development Block Grant funding, comply with the same obligation to affirmatively further fair housing.

            The state of Ohio, in an effort to more thoroughly define what would qualify as “affirmatively furthering fair housing,” laid out the standards it expected from non-entitlement communities who received federal or state dollars.  Completing an analysis of the impediments to fair housing is one of the criterions.

            An Analysis of Impediments is a comprehensive review of a community’s laws, regulations, policies, housing market, and housing practices to determine whether there exists any barriers to fair and equal access to housing.  It requires an analysis of how laws, market conditions and housing practices affect the location, availability, and accessibility of housing.  It is an assessment of private and public conditions affecting fair housing choice.

            “Impediments’ are defined as any action, omission, or decision taken that would inhibit a person’s access to housing because of race, color, religion, sex (gender), disability, familial status, or national origin (ancestry).

            The Impediments Analysis is not just an examination tool.  It is a resource for communities because it includes recommendations that a jurisdiction can use to begin to address and cure the impediments identified in the document.

            The Impediments Analysis also serves as a jumping board from which a community can develop its Fair Housing Plan.  The Fair Housing Plan includes a comprehensive strategy to effectively address and eliminate barriers in the marketplace that impede access to housing.  It also includes benchmarks that the community can use to measure its progress and determine how well it has accomplished its fair housing goals.

HUD realized that in order to develop effective and appropriate strategies for securing fair housing throughout America, that the impetus for developing those strategies had to start at the community level.  In order to develop effective and appropriate strategies, one must first identify those strategies.  It is those who live in the communities who can best identify and gauge what barriers exist in their locales.  If  fair housing is to become a reality, it is also those in the community who will have to effect it. As HUD so aptly put it, “The goal of devolution of responsibility in the area of fair housing means that communities will have the authority and the responsibility to decide the nature and extent of impediments to fair housing and decide what they believe can and should be done to address those impediments.”[1] 

To gauge housing practices and barriers to free housing choice, the Center solicited responses from the community.  The following organizations were interviewed and the information from those interviews compiled for this report. 

Ø      Henry Housing Authority

Ø      Rural Opportunities

Ø      Board of Realtors®

Ø      Amherst Village

Ø      Behavioral Connections

Ø      City of Bowling Green

Ø      Bowling Green Manor

Ø      Bowling Green State University, Administration Department

Ø      Bowling Green State University, Institutional Research Department

Ø      Fairview Manor

Ø      Cedar Park

Ø      Ohio Housing Finance Agency

Ø      Ohio Department of Development

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CURRENT STATE OF FAIR HOUSING & ASSESSMENT OF FAIR HOUSING PROGRAMS

With the passage of the Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 (the Fair Housing Act), Congress mandated the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to administer all housing and urban development programs in a manner that would affirmatively further fair housing.  Accordingly, every program managed by HUD includes provisions that require recipients to comply with the Fair Housing Act and adopt fair housing goals.  HUD has required recipients of HUD dollars to certify that they affirmatively promote fair housing.  Further, HUD requires recipients to analyze impediments to fair housing that exist in their jurisdictions and to develop measures that sufficiently address those barriers.

Recognizing that barriers to open and free housing continue to exist, the past four administrations beginning with President Reagan have engaged measures to enhance and encourage compliance with fair housing laws. President Reagan signed into law the Fair Housing Amendments Act that broadened the authority of HUD to promote and execute the statute. 

The Act also increased the responsibility of the Justice Department and strengthened its enforcement role.  Assistant Secretaries Judith Brachman and Jack Stokvis issued a memorandum to all Community Development Block Grant Entitlement Communities outlining their duty to affirmatively further fair housing.  This memorandum, the first of its kind, strongly encouraged municipalities to conduct impediments analyses, develop mechanisms to address them, and create partnerships with fair housing organizations. 

During President George Bush’s administration, Assistant Secretaries Gordon Mansfield and Anna Kondratas reissued this memorandum citing the recent passage of the National Affordable Housing Act and its requirement that all participating jurisdictions certify their intention to affirmatively further fair housing.  Moreover, Secretary Kemp and President Bush made fair housing one of six priorities at HUD.

Most recently, President G.W. Bush and HUD Secretary Mel Martinez reiterated HUD’s fair housing priorities and related them to the Administration’s goal of increasing the homeownership rate.  The President and Secretary Martinez pointed out that in order for this important goal to be reached, the homeownership rate among African-Americans, Latinos and Native-Americans, in particular, would have to increase dramatically.

On January 17, 1994, President Clinton signed Executive Order 12892 entitled, “Leadership and Coordination of Fair Housing in Federal Programs: Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing.”  The order was signed to enhance the promotion of fair housing in all federal programs as well as activities relating to housing and urban development.  The Order reiterates the Secretary of Housing & Urban Development’s role in furthering fair housing and underscores the responsibility of the head of each executive agency to ensure  “its programs and activities relating to housing and urban development are administered in a manner to affirmatively further the goal of fair housing …”  The Order also established the President’s Fair Housing Council consisting of all Cabinet members, the Chair of the Federal Reserve, the Comptroller of the Currency, the Director of the Office of Thrift Supervision, and the Chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.  The President’s Executive Order expands the authority of the Secretary of HUD to take necessary measures to provide leadership and coordinate efforts in all deferral programs to make fair housing a reality.

In an attempt to better manage the various programs it administers and carry out the President’s Order, HUD merged the following application and planning documents into one document – the Consolidated Plan.   The implementing regulations for the Consolidated Plan expressly state that each jurisdiction must certify that it will affirmatively further fair housing.  This mandate is not new.  However, what is new is the expressed charge for each jurisdiction to conduct an analysis of fair housing impediments and to develop strategies that address identified impediments.  According to the implementing regulations for the Consolidated Plan, the first analysis was to have been completed by February, 1996.

Likewise, the state of Ohio has adopted aggressive fair housing goals for those who receive federal or state dollars.  The Ohio Department of Development created definitive fair housing standards in 1993.  HUD’s mandate that communities “affirmatively further fair housing” sometimes left the state wondering exactly what HUD meant by this declaration.  Thus, the state decided to adopt specific standards that would clearly define the mandate for small cities, who were not entitlements, to meet their fair housing obligations.

The state’s standard is clear.  In summary, each community must have:

·        General Information Contact so that residents can call someone regarding fair housing issues;

·        Fair Housing complaint Intake and Referral System;

·        Education and Outreach on Fair Housing Rights and Definition of Housing Discrimination;

·        Impediments Analysis

      The Training and Technical Assistance Section of the Ohio Department of Development monitors small cities to ensure their fair housing compliance.  According to the Civil Rights Specialist with the Training and Technical Assistance Section, Bowling Green is in compliance with its fair housing requirements. 

            The City of Bowling Green, as a result of its previous Impediments Analysis, has implemented a Fair Housing Plan to address previously identified barriers in the housing market.  Previously identified barriers, goals and actions are included below.

FAIR HOUSING PLAN

Impediment

Goal and Recommendation

Action

Analysis of Impediments needs to be updated.

Update AI

Issue contract with Fair Housing Center to update AI.

Lack of community understanding of Fair Housing Laws

Contract with the Fair Housing Center to distribute information, conduct seminars, schedule ads, and investigate and resolve complaints

Fair Housing Center distributes materials, conducted fair housing seminars and ads, and investigated and resolved complaints.  FHC completes annual report on each activity.  Materials in English and Spanish.

The City will maintain dialogue with advocacy groups representing low income, disabled and families with special needs.  Distribute FH and Landlord Tenant booklets.

Conduct Homebuyer Counseling for applicants to the City’s housing programs.

Lack of publicity regarding Fair Housing Laws

Undertake activities which publicize Fair Housing policies

Fair Housing Center conducts seminars at BGSU, and real estate groups.  FHC prepares and places PSAs and advertising re: FH guidelines.

City monitors advertising related to rental housing.

Negative impact of lack of affordable housing on consumer choice.

Maintain programs which increase the supply of affordable housing.

City maintains grant programs for low income housing programs, Section 8, landlord participation in Rental Rehab programs, support of transitional housing units.

Lack of participation from protected classes in programs

Target advertising for affordable housing to promote participation by these populations.

City markets programs through social services, human resources departments, flyers and brochures.  City also maintains brochures and advertising in Spanish.