Template: Letter to your city council

The following letter makes a statement then asks a couple questions, it’s available here and intended to prompt you for ideas.  Use it if you like; copy into Word, modify, and send to each member of your city council including the mayor:

Dear Parker Town Council Member,

My concern is about Douglas County accepting HUD subsidies on behalf of the Town of Parker in light of the new HUD AFFH, Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing, rule that promotes low income housing in the (wealthy) suburbs. Douglas County has been specifically targeted as one of 1250 communities nationally, for implementation should we accept HUD grant monies.   Town of Castle Rock recently discovered this new AFFH rule that only went into effect July 19, and last Tuesday investigated and voted 5-1 against accepting HUD grants.

The following is a personal note from Jennifer Green, Castle Rock Town Council Member, Tuesday, 8/18/15
jgreen@crgov.com

“The documentation I presented last night was from the HUD site as well as other government documentation. I purposely stuck with those documents as I know some on Council do best with “bare bone” facts. They can argue against any website, but cannot argue against the documentation HUD released. I also read questions from the AFFH Tool itself that is a requirement for recipients of HUD funding to complete. The questions were astonishing and strategically pointed to race, language, etc.”

Similar to Castle Rock, my first question is whether previous voting by the Town of Parker has already (unknowingly) committed support for AFFH. Is the Town of Parker already obligated to support Douglas County which is a locality targeted by HUD? My second question is whether the Town of Parker can rescind on previous voting resolutions?

It’s important to understand that by accepting HUD grants and using HUD’s AFFH database tool (that can be used against us), the long term impact may be that our local zoning laws and planning commission actions will be overridden to impose low income housing into our neighborhood.

name
address
City, St, zip

phone

Reference: www.affh.net