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[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 1025 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>

116th CONGRESS
  2d Session
H. RES. 1025

     Expressing support for the designation of June as ``National 
 Homeownership Month'', honoring the critical importance of increased 
 homeownership to overall affordable housing goals, and acknowledging 
 the necessity of using comprehensive resources within the legislative 
and policy toolbox, together with vital public-private partnerships, to 
 allow communities across the United States to provide access to safe 
and secure housing for all Americans, regardless of income level, while 
  promoting diversity consistent with the ideal of the American Dream 
               during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             June 26, 2020

Mr. Clay submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the 
                    Committee on Financial Services

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION

 
     Expressing support for the designation of June as ``National 
 Homeownership Month'', honoring the critical importance of increased 
 homeownership to overall affordable housing goals, and acknowledging 
 the necessity of using comprehensive resources within the legislative 
and policy toolbox, together with vital public-private partnerships, to 
 allow communities across the United States to provide access to safe 
and secure housing for all Americans, regardless of income level, while 
  promoting diversity consistent with the ideal of the American Dream 
               during the time of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Whereas for over 80 years it has been the policy of the United States to promote 
        the general welfare of the Nation by employing its funds and credit to 
        assist States and localities to remedy unsafe housing conditions and the 
        acute shortage of decent and safe dwellings for low income families 
        under the United States Housing Act of 1937;
Whereas the House of Representatives, which has over a period of many years 
        endeavored to address housing and homeownership, and has had some 
        success in doing so through related appropriations and authorizing 
        legislation, has committed itself to meeting the affordable housing and 
        community development needs of the country;
Whereas the disparate impact standard under the Fair Housing Act is a 
        longstanding protection that allows people to challenge policies that 
        might seem neutral on their face but result in discriminatory outcomes;
Whereas a government-sponsored corporation, the Homeowners Loan Corporation 
        (HOLC), established in 1933, implemented a system of redlining for years 
        that rated neighborhoods based on a number of factors, including race;
Whereas, in 1911, a St. Louis, Missouri, neighborhood enacted a racially 
        restrictive covenant designed to prevent African Americans and Asian 
        Americans from living in the area and in 1945 the Shelleys, an African-
        American family, moved into the neighborhood prompting Louis Kraemer to 
        sue to enforce the covenant and prevent them from moving into their 
        house, resulting in a Supreme Court decision that although restrictive 
        covenants did not fall under constitutional protection, State 
        enforcement of such covenants violates the Equal Protection Clause of 
        the Fourteenth Amendment;
Whereas the National Association of Real Estate Boards, which became the 
        National Association of Realtors, had harmful racial discrimination as 
        part of its ethics code;
Whereas prior to the passage of the Fair Housing Act in 1968, Federal, State, 
        and local governments actively and explicitly enforced policies that 
        discriminated against racial minorities seeking homeownership 
        opportunities, making it harder for them to purchase homes in certain 
        neighborhoods or to obtain financing on fair terms, and during much of 
        the 20th century, State and local governments promoted segregation in 
        neighborhoods across the Nation by actively enforcing racially 
        restrictive covenants, which were legally enforceable provisions in 
        property deeds that prohibited racial minorities from purchasing homes 
        in White residential neighborhoods;
Whereas during the height of the foreclosure crisis, about a quarter of African-
        American and Latino homeowners had lost their homes to foreclosure or 
        were seriously delinquent, compared to just under 12 percent for White 
        homeowners and just under 14 percent for Asian-American homeowners, and 
        by 2011, 25 percent of Black homeowners and 28 percent of Hispanic 
        homeowners had underwater mortgages, a home purchase loan with a higher 
        outstanding principal obligation than the fair-market value of the home, 
        compared to just 15 percent of White homeowners;
Whereas a National Fair Housing Alliance report in December 2019 found an 87-
        percent rate of racial steering, perverse redlining, and other harrowing 
        forms of discrimination for families seeking to purchase homes in 12 
        cities across the United States;
Whereas 2018 Census Bureau data found the homeownership rate was 73 percent for 
        non-Hispanic White households, 42 percent for African-American 
        households, 47 percent for Hispanic or Latinx households, and 58 percent 
        for Asian or Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander households, and in the 
        past 15 years, Black homeownership has seen the most dramatic drop of 
        any racial or ethnic group and it is now as low as it was when 
        discrimination was legal, contributing to the racial wealth gap;
Whereas a 2016 DEMOS study found that eliminating disparities in homeownership 
        rates and returns would substantially reduce the racial wealth gap;
Whereas the 2016 DEMOS study found that Black and Latino homeowners saw less 
        return in wealth on their investment in homeownership, finding that for 
        every $1 in wealth that accrues to median Black households as a result 
        of homeownership, median White households accrue $1.34, while for every 
        $1 in wealth that accrues to median Latino households as a result of 
        homeownership, median White households accrue $1.54;
Whereas the Center for Responsible Lending testified in May 2019 to the 
        Subcommittee on Housing, Community Development and Insurance of the 
        Financial Services Committee of the House of Representatives that data 
        from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act continues to demonstrate low 
        levels of conventional mortgage loans to African-American and Latino 
        families and, further, the Center for Investigative Reporting Reveal 
        report analyzed 31 million mortgage records and found that, in 61 
        metropolitan areas in the United States, African Americans and Latinos 
        are more likely to be turned down for a conventional mortgage 
        application than similarly situated White borrowers, among other forms 
        of invidious discrimination; and
Whereas equal access to homeownership opportunities enhances social and economic 
        diversity, promotes inclusion, and reaffirms equality and is consistent 
        with principles of capitalism: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives supports the 
designation of ``National Homeownership Month'' and honors the 
importance of the sacrosanct and uniquely American idea of 
homeownership.
                                 <all>
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