End Housing Discrimination.
State governments can put increased pressure on landlords to stop unfair evictions, rent gouging, and housing discrimination through vigorous enforcement of the Fair Housing laws and an expansion of housing litigation and testing procedures. Fair Housing Councils around the nation are hampered by insufficient budgets and lack of real commitment from both the business community and local cities in enforcing housing discrimination provisions. State governments also can discourage irresponsible redevelopment in local areas where such redevelopment threatens to gentrify an area at the expense of working and poor people, as is occurring in SanFrancisco, California. Housing and homeless activists can have a larger impact at the state level if there is a renewed federal commitment to working families and the poor.