Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: We are live.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: We're live with senate appropriation. It's January 15. We're going through budgets adjustment. FY '26 budget adjustments. We have the rights commission by the senate. So introduce yourself for the record and let us know what you have in the budget adjustment.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Thank you. Hi, everyone. Nice to see you again. My name is Faith Hartman. I use theythem pronouns. I'm the executive director and general counsel at the State of Illinois Human Rights Commission. I come to you today to talk about the Budget Adjustment Act. The governor has recommended that we receive an additional $25,000. This is to address the shortfall we are currently projecting because we do not anticipate receiving any money from HUD. Historically, we've operated on a cooperating agreement with HUD to handle our fair housing investigations. And each year, we're paid for the work we did in the prior year. We are paid per case that we will file and close each year. So normally, we receive the money from the prior year's work in September. So, we should have, by now, received a much larger sum than what we're requesting from the budget adjustment for the cases that we closed last year from PUD. Unfortunately

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you work on our fiscal year or their fiscal year?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: They pay us this fiscal year for the work we completed last fiscal year.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: On state fiscal year or federal fiscal year?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Their performance year aligns with our fiscal year. So, as you can imagine, the Trump administration has deprioritized civil rights enforcement, especially fair housing work. One of the ways we are seeing that play out is with the Fair Housing Assistance Program, under which we are having this cooperating agreement that's been in place. It gets renewed each year, and it's been in place for at least ten years. So they told us in October, right before the shutdown, that payments it's gonna be a different payment process. But as I sit here today, I'm not aware of any FAP agency in the country having received their money for the work that they performed last year. Super disappointing because last year we really upped our fair housing cases because we saw it as the one place that we could really grow our budget. And we actually earned, under that cooperative agreement, twice as much as what we had budgeted to receive. We budgeted to receive around 92,000, where we were slated to receive 187,000 and we had gotten zero. Thankfully though, if we keep really lean with our budget, which we always do, we're still able to provide salary, benefits, and maintain our operating expenses with only $25,000 additional for this budget year.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So you filled the positions that you had from last

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: You sure did. We got those two additional positions in fiscal year twenty six budget, a fourth staff attorney investigator, and a full time intake coordinator position. Thankfully, I was able to direct hire two individuals who had previously worked in our office, and they were able to hit the ground running in August, and they both had extremely full caseloads now. That They

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: started in August.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: They started in August, yeah, which is like record speed in state government. So, and they both already knew how to do their jobs, for the most part. It was really a great situation for us to be able to process more new inquiries. You know, we get a high volume of calls each day, and emails each day from individuals trying to file a complaint with us, or to ask questions about our jurisdiction, and now we have a fourth investigator enabling us to process more cases, hopefully more quickly. And that's been wonderful. And the concern for AHEAD is that in along with the other kind of squirrelly behavior we're seeing from HUD in terms of doing the voucher for our payment, they're also informing all of the agencies like ours across the country that they're gonna be doing a new review of everyone who's previously had a cooperating agreement, and if our state fair housing laws have more legally protected categories than our federal fair housing law, which only has seven legally protected categories, then we are not going to be deemed substantially equivalent, and therefore we will be removed from the program altogether. So, we are looking ahead and concerned about fiscal year 'twenty seven because we usually budget just under $100,000 each year from what. That would be a problem for the future.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Would there be an option to set up a cooperative agreement that you just, like, when you're trying the seven categories that they find acceptable, but you'd still be able to build them, or they're just like, you're either aligned with us, figure it out entirely.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Yeah. So when we initially became what's called a FAP agency, Fair Housing Assistance Program agency, they do this review where they compare our state law to the federal law, and as long as we have the same protected categories, we're considered substantially equivalent. They're rewriting the rules on that, and they're going to they warned us that any jurisdiction that has more protections will not be deemed substantially equivalent, and therefore would not be eligible At all. For a cooperating agreement at all. We've already, in the past year, been dealing with them saying that they will not be paying us for any cases involving gender identity discrimination, but now it seems like they're prepared to go a step further. I speak with my counterparts in, especially New England area, all the time, and we are all going about requesting from our HUD contact who we think still works there.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: And we expect to get if we can get paid, and that there's absolutely no updates given. So, you know, some other offices in the country really rely on a much more substantial volume of federal funds to keep their staff employed. Thankfully, this year's shortfall is only expected to be 25,000 to enable us to just kind of keep the lights on and fix salaries

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: for the year. This fiscal year?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Through June. Through this fiscal year. Of course, we had earned more than that under the contract, and we were planning on doing a lot of additional enforcement activities, outreach, and possibly even some fair housing testing programs. We've scrapped all of those streams for now, and we'll just be happy to stay fully employed for the year.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But you're hoping to get that money, that study arose.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: We are hoping to get it, but it seems unlikely that we will receive it without agreeing to some new mandatory provisions that are additional requirements that we've never seen before.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Even if those weren't from

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: before? New ones for just this year.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But it's for work that you already

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: did? Yes.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Also, we're not gonna pay for that work without this new petition.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: That's what we kept asking. What's because they were, like in October, they were telling us it was gonna be this new voucher process. Usually, it's just like a formality to sign the voucher that's already signed by HUD, and then you can do your drawdown. That usually happens in August or September. This year, they said, we're doing a new voucher program. And we all expect that if we ever do get a voucher, that it's going to ask us to sign on to the mandatory provisions. The mandatory provisions include probably a lot of the things that you've been seeing from other agencies that are strings attached to receiving federal funds. But the most concerning ones for our purpose require that we comply with the executive order regarding gender ideology, which basically puts us at odds with our legal protections to enforce anti discrimination protections based on gender And did not engage in any DDI activities, which is basically all of the training that we do. Could very, very easily categorize those DDI. They have also told agencies that we will not be permitted to issue any disparate impact liability theories, which is kind of the cornerstone of how we address systemic segregation and lingering discrimination. And it's not even like, you won't use these federal funds to do this stuff, it is like, you will not do this stuff at all. So, 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.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay, Senator Brennan. But that shouldn't have anything to do with the contracted work you've already done, should it? I mean, going forward is gonna be tough, obviously, but you caught are you under contract for the work you did last year?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: We had a cooperating agreement that we found since last year.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So they're obligated, I would say, to write you that check?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: We certainly believe that they're obligated to write us that check, but they haven't come out and said they're not writing us the check. So we're in this holding pattern, and then if they're needed to be litigation to enforce our rights under the law, it's not gonna get us to where we need to be to make pit roll.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yes. But you would have gotten that in previous years by now.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Oh, yeah. We would get it before we're even, yeah, in August or September, so it's already usually in the bank and long term.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And you got none, think you got zero. Zero. Because usually it's about one, it's dry down once a year.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Yep. So, yeah, we were budgeted to receive about 92,000 this year. Thankfully, all we need is 25, and I'm not here talking to you about almost $100,000

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. I'm glad you're not able to keep the staff. That means it's allowed me to hire. I am too. That would have been unfortunate. Senator Watson, do you do?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Well, you've been asked, made my. Yeah, we have declined to pay for staff training that we normally do in professional development. You know, we have six attorneys on staff, so there's a lot of CLEs that we pay for typically, and licensure. We don't have any of that this year. And that's a sacrifice. Those attorneys will have to pay for that out of pocket to maintain their licensure. But, you know, we wanted to be able to come to the administration and to these committees saying this is the bare minimum that we need to get through the fiscal year, and that's what that twenty five thousand dollars number is.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay, we appreciate it.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: You mentioned a phrase which I have not heard for, disparate impact theory. Sure. Is that did I get that right? Yeah. The phrase? So they're saying, no. You can't you can't talk about disparate impact. Like, basically, racism or any kind of ism happened and there were disparate impacts. Is that sort of what it is? Discrimination usually has one of two theories. One is your run of the mill. I think I was treated differently, I was denied housing because of my race. That's disparate treatment. Disparate impact is where you have a policy or a practice or a procedure that's not discriminatory on its face, but the impact of that policy or procedure is to unintentionally discriminate against people. So it's where we address things like redlining, equal pay issues. We use it in employment law. We use it in fair housing. We use it in all forms of discrimination. To put any limit on our ability to use that is highly problematic and really restricts us. And it's definitely disparate impact is one of the cornerstones of civil rights enforcement is and, you know, the Department of Justice is the agency that has put out the guidance that all of us rely on in how to do disparate impact analyses. So, you know, it's just one of the many challenges we're all in in this world as it is right now.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay, well thank you. Any other questions?

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: I'm just here to brighten your day. I'll be back in a few weeks probably, and we can talk about the challenge ahead.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah.

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: Yeah. Thank you so much. Thank you. You.

[Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And I assume Sheriff's and Journeys is going to be in person? Sure. It could be

[Faith Hartman, Executive Director and General Counsel, State of Illinois Human Rights Commission]: about