Communities receiving United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) grants are required, at least once every five years, to analyze impediments to fair housing choice within their jurisdictions and create a set of action plans to mitigate identified impediments. As recipients of Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds, Erie County, the City of Buffalo, and the Towns of Amherst, Cheektowaga, Hamburg, and Tonawanda are required to complete an Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice. Collectively, Erie County and the Towns of Amherst, Cheektowaga, Hamburg and Tonawanda last completed an Analysis of Impediments in 2015. The City of Buffalo completed its last Analysis of Impediments in 2014. These entitlement communities have collaborated to complete this current Analysis of Impediments (AI).
HUD grantees are required, per the Community Development Act of 1974, and as amended, to “affirmatively further fair housing,” which necessitates that grantee communities conduct an analysis of impediments to fair housing choice and take meaningful action to fight discrimination and restricted access to housing and opportunity for persons with protected class characteristics. Those protected class characteristics are race, color, religion, sex, national origin, familial status, and disability.
The entitlement communities fulfill their requirement to affirmatively further fair housing by:
▪ Conducting an Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice
▪ Developing actions to overcome the effects of identified impediments to fair housing
▪ Maintaining records to support each jurisdiction’s initiatives to affirmatively further fair housing