• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Doctors for Change

Rebuilding a Healthier Houston Together

  • Who We Are
    • Mission & Vision
    • Leadership
  • Our Committees
    • Access to Care
    • Anti-Human Trafficking
    • Healthy Eating & Active Living
    • Immigrant and Refugee Health
    • Mental Health
    • Queer Health
    • Student Chapters
  • Advocacy
    • Share Your Story!
    • DFC 2019 Policy Priorities
    • 2019 Austin Advocacy Days
  • Get Involved
    • Join a Committee
    • Become a DFC Member
    • Volunteer with DFC
  • Resources
    • DFC Newsletter Archive
    • COVID-19 Resources for Medical/Healthcare Providers
    • Continuing Medical Education (CME) Opportunity
    • A Step-by-Step Guide for Integrating Social Determinants of Health into Your Practice (Credit to HCPH)
    • DFC Guide (under maintenance)
  • Donate #ForChange
    • 2019 Luncheon Sponsors
    • Silent Auction Sponsors
  • Become a Member
    • My Account
    • Sign In
    • Sign Out
  • DFC Blog
  • Calendar
  • Contact Us
  • FREE MAT WAIVER TRAINING

Help Protect a Core Tool for Fighting Discrimination and Access to Affordable Housing

October 11, 2019 by DFC

From: The National LGBTQ Anti-Poverty Action Network

Dear friends,

Everyone should have the opportunity for a place to call home. Where we live impacts every aspect of our lives — access to good jobs, quality schools, and a clean, secure, and healthy environment. The Fair Housing Act has worked for more than 50 years to eliminate barriers to housing and promote opportunity for women, people of color, families with children, people with disabilities, and more communities. As our nation becomes more diverse in every way, the Fair Housing Act helps to foster stronger and more inclusive communities, which are critical to our collective success and prosperity.

As many of you know, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) issued a proposed rule that, if finalized and implemented, would significantly roll back a vital protection against housing segregation and discrimination. Specifically, the proposed rule would erode the disparate impact legal theory used to protect against housing discrimination. The disparate-impact theory has been critical in advancing access to safe, affordable, and stable housing for women, women of color, LGBTQ people, immigrants, gender-based violence survivors, families with children, people with disabilities, and so many more. Disparate impact is also used in education, health care, employment, environment, and other contexts, and we do not anticipate the Trump Administration stopping its civil rights attacks with housing. We must join together to maintain the full force of our federal civil rights laws, including the Fair Housing Act, because racial, gender, and other forms of discrimination still persist. Longstanding protections against inequality are more important than ever. We must fight any efforts to take away the rights that we all share and hold dear.

This proposed rule has multiple ripple effects, with housing impacting every aspect of our lives and the attack on disparate impact in housing potentially trickling to disparate impact in other sectors as well. HUD must read every unique comment before they can issue a final rule. To help slow down the rulemaking process and help build strong opposition so this proposal hopefully never goes into effect, we urge you to engage in this critical comment period through Friday, October 18 in any of the following ways:

  • Tailor this gender justice organizational template developed by the ACLU Women’s Rights Project and the National Women’s Law Centerto align with your organization’s mission. Please remember to modify, reorder, expand the language in the template so your comment is counted as unique and read by HUD to slow down this rulemaking process. You can also add content from other sector templates including the LGBTQ community (thanks National LGBTQ Task Force and Lambda Legal!), education, fair housing, gender-based violence, transportation, and many more on the way at https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1EOQvBEXoXUUvS9MKC3X72se_BGG17vgw.
  • Is the gender justice organizational template too long for you to adapt to make it unique? Never fear! You can adapt this 3-page templateACLU developed into your own organizational comment.
  • Help facilitate mass individual comments by sharing the NWLC comment portal or these partner coalition portals: Defend Civil Rights and #FightforHousingJustice
  • Join the #DefendCivilRights tweetstorm on Monday, October 7 from 2-3PMET. Access the toolkit here.
  • Host a commenting party!
  • Share these engagement opportunities with your network to encourage them to submit comments as well.

This is an attack on women, children, and families. Together we can raise our voices to protect the core values we hold so dear in this country. We hope your organization will engage in this comment campaign, and please reach out to Sandra Park ([email protected]) or Linda Morris ([email protected]) of the ACLU Women’s Rights Project and/or Sarah Hassmer ([email protected]) of the National Women’s Law Center if you have any questions.

Filed Under: Advocacy, Announcements, Community

Primary Sidebar

Newsletter

Calendar

January 23, 2021
  • The 8th Annual Out for Health Conference will be hosted by McGovern Medical School

    When: January 23, 2021 - 7:45 am to 5:00 pm


    Full details:

    https://med.uth.edu/blog/2021/01/06/mcgovern-to-host-out-for-health-conference/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Scoop_December-17-2020 

    The 8th Annual Out for Health Conference will be hosted by McGovern Medical School from 7:45 a.m. to 5 p.m. Jan. 23 via Cisco Webex.

    Out for Health is a medical conference founded and organized by students across all Texas medical schools in order to address the needs of the LGBTQIA+ population. The conference creates spaces for students, faculty, and community members to come together and discuss challenges faced by these patients. The event unites students and health professionals across disciplines to learn how to provide more inclusive health care.

    The theme of the 2021 conference is “intersectionality,” recognizing the marginalization of minority groups within the LGBTQIA+ community. By drawing parallels between the current Black Lives Matter movement and the queer liberation movement of the 1960s, and between the current COVID-19 pandemic and the AIDS epidemic, the conference strives to empower the healthcare field to identify and fight systemic discrimination on all levels.

    This year, Earl Fowlkes, chairman of the LGBT Caucus at the Democratic National Committee, will deliver the keynote speech titled “Out of the Shadows: The Intersectionality of Black LGBTQ+ Physical and Mental Health.”

    For more information, or to register for Out for Health 2021, visit the event’s website or contact [email protected].

January 26, 2021
  • AHT Forum

    When: January 26, 2021 - 6:30 pm to 8:00 pm


    Full details:

    Please register for Hidden in Plain Sight: Identification and Healthcare Needs of Forced Laborers in the United States:  on Jan 26, 2021 6:00 PM CST at:

    https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/2536000891899715342

    After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

February 10, 2021
  • DFC Board Meeting

    When: February 10, 2021 - 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm

    Where: Children At Risk, 2900 Weslayan St #400, Houston, TX 77027, USA


    Full details:

    Quarterly meeting for DFC Board Members.

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

DFC Membership

Sign in
  • Sitemap
  • Careers
  • Contact

Copyright © 2021 · Doctors for Change on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in