Opinion ID: 627446
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Housing Act and Regulations

Text: 7 The United States Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1437 et seq., illustrates Congress' commitment to providing safe and affordable housing to low-income families. 8 It is the policy of the United States to promote the general welfare of the Nation by employing its funds and credit ... to assist the several States and their political subdivisions to remedy the unsafe and unsanitary housing conditions and the acute shortage of decent, safe, and sanitary dwellings for families of lower income.... 9 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1437. Pursuant to this policy, the Housing Act provides that the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) shall by regulation require each public housing agency [ (PHA) ] receiving assistance under this chapter to establish and implement an administrative grievance procedure which meets a variety of procedural requirements. 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1437d(k). 3 10 The regulations require each PHA to establish a grievance procedure which applies to all individual grievances ... between the tenant and the PHA. 24 C.F.R. Secs. 966.51(1)(a)(1), 966.52(a) (1992). The regulations define a grievance as any dispute which a tenant may have with respect to PHA action or failure to act in accordance with the individual tenant's lease or PHA regulations which adversely affect the individual tenant's rights, duties, welfare or status. 24 C.F.R. Sec. 966.53(a) (1992) (emphasis added). 4 At the time of Saxton's request, THA had an existing grievance procedure which tracked the requirements contained in 24 C.F.R. Secs. 966.54-.57 (1992). 11 In addition to the broad definition of grievance contained in the regulations, the history of the Housing Act and regulations suggest that Congress intended the grievance procedures to apply to a wide range of situations. We agree with the approach taken by the District of Columbia Circuit in Samuels v. District of Columbia, 770 F.2d 184 (D.C.Cir.1985), which held that public housing officials could be sued under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 for systematically failing to provide grievance hearings to public housing tenants. The Samuels court traced the history of the grievance regulations, noting that in 1982 HUD proposed a revision which would have made the procedures applicable only to disputes over tenant selection and rent calculation. Id. at 190; 47 Fed.Reg. 55,689, 55,692 (1982). In response to this proposal, Congress specifically amended the Act to require PHAs to establish and maintain an administrative grievance procedure for the resolution of all tenant disputes concerning adverse PHA action. Samuels, 770 F.2d at 190 (emphasis added); Housing and Urban-Rural Recovery Act of 1983, Sec. 204, Pub.L. No. 98-181, 97 Stat. 1153, 1178, codified at 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1437d(k). We agree.