Statement from Rep. Edolphus "Ed" Towns in Support of HUD's new Civil Rights Policies

Statement

Rep. Edolphus "Ed" Towns (D-NY) today released the following remarks in support of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)'s extension of civil rights protections to its grant programs:

"Today, HUD has taken an important step towards ensuring equality. For the first time in history, HUD has announced that it will now require grant applicants seeking HUD funding to comply with state and local anti-discrimination laws that protect lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender (LGBT) individuals. All competitively awarded grant programs will now require an affirmative demonstration based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

As a long-time advocate against discrimination in the housing market, I applaud HUD for taking this important step towards the assurance of equality. We are fortunate in New York State to have laws that protect against housing discrimination on the basis of gender identity and sexual orientation. As such, HUD's new grant requirement will ensure that federal taxpayer dollars are not awarded to organizations that choose to disobey local anti-discrimination laws.

While more work still needs to be done, rest assured that I will continue to fight for equality for all."

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