The Department of Housing and Urban Development must implement a rule to help low-income families in 23 metropolitan areas find housing on Jan. 1, 2018, a federal judge said Saturday, according to a report in the Hill.
HUD in August under Secretary Ben Carson suspended the implementation of the Small Area Fair Market Rent rule, which would have increased the amount of money the government would pay for voucher-holders to rent homes in “high-opportunity neighborhoods” and lowered the amount voucher-holders would receive for renting in “low-opportunity neighborhoods.”
HUD said it needed to analyze the costs and benefits of the program before moving forward and suspended it for two years.
“This case is about the rule of law—whether an agency effectively may suspend a duly promulgated regulation without observing the procedures or identifying relevant factual criteria that the law requires to effect such a change,” Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell wrote.
"The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development ('HUD'), without notice and comment or particularized evidentiary findings, has delayed almost entirely by two years implementation of a rule requiring over 200 local Public Housing Authorities ('PHAs') in 24 metropolitan areas, which HUD selected based on fixed, objective criteria, to calculate housing vouchers’ values based on local, rather than metropolitan-wide, prevailing market rents.”
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