Illinois Human Rights Commission asks Senate for $25,000 as HUD payments stall

Vic Hartman, executive director and general counsel of the State of Illinois Human Rights Commission, told the Senate Appropriations panel on Jan. 15 the agency needs a $25,000 budget adjustment after expected federal payments under a long-standing cooperative agreement with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development have not arrived.

Hartman said the Commission normally draws HUD funds in September for cases filed and closed in the prior year, but as of the hearing the office had received none of the anticipated federal payments. “We budgeted to receive around $92,000,” Hartman said, “and we had gotten 0.” The $25,000 request, they said, would keep current staffing and basic operations funded through the fiscal year.

The request matters beyond immediate payroll: Hartman warned that HUD is revising the Fair Housing Assistance Program’s review process and told agencies they may be found not ‘‘substantially equivalent’’ if state fair-housing laws include protections beyond the federal baseline. Hartman also said HUD has indicated it would not pay for cases involving gender-identity discrimination and may bar use of disparate-impact theories — a tool the Commission relies on to address systemic segregation and pattern-or-practice discrimination.

Those changes, Hartman said, could make it impossible for the Commission to certify compliance with any new HUD conditions while still performing its duties under Illinois law. “It’s difficult to envision a world where I could certify compliance with those terms and still do the job that the Human Rights Commission is tasked with doing under state law,” Hartman said.

Hartman told the committee the agency recently added two positions — a fourth staff attorney-investigator and a full-time intake coordinator — that began work in August and significantly increased case-processing capacity. To cope with the shortfall, the Commission has curtailed planned enforcement activities, outreach, testing programs and staff professional training.

An unidentified committee member pressed whether HUD should still be obligated to pay for work already completed. The member said the cooperative agreement should require HUD to issue the payment; Hartman said the Commission believes HUD is obligated but has not said it will not write the check and that litigation would not solve immediate payroll needs.

Hartman said the $25,000 represents the “bare minimum” needed to continue operations through June. They said the Commission is coordinating with counterparts in other states to seek clarifications from HUD and expected to return to the committee in a few weeks for further discussion.

The panel did not take a vote during the recorded exchange; the request remained under consideration at the close of the testimony.