Judge: HUD acted illegally in changing homelessness grant rules

A federal judge in Rhode Island ruled that the Department of Housing and Urban Development acted illegally in making changes to Continuum of Care Builds grant eligibility criteria, reports Annika Melwani in The Brown Daily Herald.

As Melwani explains, "The federal government’s updated eligibility criteria included stipulations in line with Trump administration priorities, requiring that nonprofits applying for funding must not 'use a definition of sex other than as binary' or 'facilitate racial preferences.' The change also would have restricted grant access for programs in sanctuary jurisdictions, according to the lawsuit." 

Plaintiffs in the case argued that HUD's actions run afoul of the Administrative Procedure Act and that the new conditions are not related to the delivery of services or other merits of the application. "The plaintiffs argued that the government’s main faults were 'making these changes so late in the game after statutory deadlines' and 'implementing these new political agendas without providing any evidence that that’s a good thing to do.'"