Fair Housing Month:

Here at EXIT Realty Mountain View we celebrating Fair Housing Month. The State of Colorado was the first in the nation to pass statewide fair housing laws, barring discrimination in housing in 1959, nine years before the signing of the federal Fair Housing Act.

“The US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO) is responsible for enforcement of Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 (the federal Fair Housing Act) and other federal laws related to fair housing (such as section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and  Titles II and III of the ADA). The CCRD has been certified by HUD FHEO as a “Fair Housing Assistance Program” or “FHAP” agency. The FHAP certification is possible because Colorado’s state fair housing laws are “substantially equivalent” to the federal fair housing laws. Substantial Equivalence means Colorado fair housing law “provides substantive rights, procedures, remedies, and the availability of judicial review comparable to the federal law.”

CCRD’s certification as an FHAP means that, in circumstances where both state and federal law would apply, a case is “dual-filed,” meaning a case is assigned both a CCRD case number and a HUD case number. Most of the CCRD’s housing cases are dual-filed with HUD; however, Colorado’s fair housing laws are more expansive than the federal fair housing law – as Colorado has more protected classes (ancestry, creed, marital status, sexual orientation, and source of income), and it applies to more properties (federal law does not apply to owner-occupied buildings with four or fewer units).

Because Colorado’s Fair Housing Laws are substantially equivalent to federal fair housing laws, guidance and information about fair housing law published by HUD about fair housing is helpful and relevant to understanding the application of Colorado’s fair housing law.”