The District of Columbia Housing Authority (DCHA) is seeking to settle with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) over allegations that DCHA repeatedly violated federal laws regarding the treatment of disabled tenants living in the nation’s capital.
The letter, issued August 2024 and reported Thursday by The Washington Post, alleges that DCHA sometimes took “years to handle requests for elevator access or adequate doorway space for wheelchairs.”
“DCHA’s noncompliance is pervasive and fails to meet even the most basic rights of people with disabilities,” according to a copy of the letter obtained and viewed by the Post.
While DCHA said that it does not agree with many of the findings expressed in the letter, it is still working to settle with HUD over the accusations, said Alison Burdo, a spokeswoman for DCHA.
“Well before receiving the letter, the current DCHA administration had determined that its accessibility programming needed to be strengthened and had already begun taking steps to improve its compliance and services to people with disabilities,” Burdo told the Post.
The allegations were originally made in a 72-page report issued by HUD in 2022. It stated that DCHA was noncompliant with fair housing regulations, had a high public housing vacancy rate, unsanitary conditions at its properties and “does not properly calculate rent.”
In mid-2022, Karl Racine, who was the Attorney General of the District of Columbia at the time, filed a lawsuit against DCHA. He said that the organization has “demonstrated an egregious pattern of discrimination against individuals with disabilities and systematically fails to provide needed disability accommodations, like transfers to wheelchair accessible units, for vulnerable public housing tenants.”
That suit “remains ongoing” under the watch of current AG Brian Schwalb, the Post reported. Allegations about DCHA’s compliance with fair housing laws — which apply to those with disabilities — has a long history, but the picture in this instance is also complicated by the Trump administration‘s ongoing efforts to shrink the federal workforce.
The original HUD report detailing the allegations was issued during the height of the Biden administration, and the letter at the center of the report was originally sent in 2023.
HUD’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO) issued the letter in August, but reports suggest that office is poised to face severe cuts of as much as 77% of its budget, according to a leaked internal memo.
These developments also come during a time of a more combative relationship between federal and D.C. leaders. President Donald Trump has called on Mayor Muriel Bowser to “clean up” homeless encampments in the city and has publicly speculated about assuming control of the district.
