How Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California Positioned Itself to Address Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing in a Distinct Way

Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California (FHANC), based in Marin County, California is a unique agency, that proudly participates in both the Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) and is a HUD-approved Housing Counseling Agency (HCA). FHANC provides bi-lingual fair housing counseling services, pre-purchase counseling/education, mortgage foreclosure prevention services and advisory and training services across Marin, Sonoma, and Solano county.

Last year, FHANC provided counseling or education services to 4,843 clients. 80 percent of their fair housing clients were Latiné and Black/African American and 95 percent are extremely low to low-income. Issues of fair housing choices, equal opportunities, and inclusive communities free from discrimination remain central to FHANC and the work they do for their clients.
​
For these reasons, Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) is at the core of FHANC’s values and mission. As an HCA and FHIP agency, FHANC positions itself to address AFFH in a distinct way by:

• Conducting education and outreach to the community so that people understand the issues as featured here: Fair Housing Literature - Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California.
• Hosting an annual Fair Housing Conference in which topics are centered around AFFH and systemic discrimination. Previous conference topics have included reparations, appraisal discrimination, and source of income discrimination.
• Advocating for fair housing laws and policies and providing meaningful input in a variety of ways, including public participation in important policy decisions and processes centered around fair housing legislation such as California’s Housing Elements requirement, tenant protections and the Fair Chance Act.
• Collaborating with partners at the local, state, and federal level to remove barriers for fair housing. For example, FHANC works with Marin County on affirmative marketing strategies for recipients of Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funding. They work with applicants to ensure that they understand their role in AFFH and how they can ensure that people least likely to apply to their programs receive directed outreach.

Click here to read the full article. 
​