Your Housing Rights

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has a longstanding commitment to eliminate racial and ethnic segregation and other discriminatory practices in the provision of housing. As stated on the HUD website:

• It is HUD's mission to promote nondiscrimination and ensure fair and equal housing opportunities for all. In an ongoing effort to provide services and activities on a nondiscriminatory manner and to affirmatively further fair housing, HUD is charged by law to implement and enforce a wide array of civil rights laws, not only for members of the public in search of fair housing, but for HUD funded grant recipients as well.

HUD extends the responsibility of affirmatively furthering fair housing to local jurisdictions through a variety of regulations and program requirements. For example, HUD requires all local jurisdictions participating in the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG), HOME Investment Partnerships (HOME), Emergency Shelter Grant (ESG), and Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS (HOPWA) formula programs to complete an annual Consolidated Plan, which establishes a "unified vision for community development actions." As part of the consolidated plan process, jurisdictions were required to complete an analysis of impediments to fair housing choice ("Analysis of Impediments") report and to take actions to overcome the effects of any impediments identified through that analysis.

Aside from federal and state laws, the City of Rockford has a fair housing ordinance that prohibits discrimination and provides protection for specific classes of people based upon race, color, religion, sex, national origin, disability or familial status. This protection extends only to situations that occur within the Rockford city limits. Situations that occur outside the city limits should be referred to either that municipalities local government offices, the Illinois Department of Human Rights, or the fair housing division of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The City of Rockford recently partnered with Prairie State Legal Services' Fair Housing Project to educate Rockford-area residents and increase awareness of fair housing rights by creating a short video.

For more information view the Prairie State Legal's Fair Housing Project website.

If you would like to file a Fair Housing complaint, please download and fill out the Illinois Housing/Real Estate Transaction Complainant Information Sheet.