Mission and History

The mission of the Connecticut Fair Housing Center is to ensure that all people have equal access to housing opportunities in Connecticut, free from discrimination.

Because housing discrimination disproportionately affects people with low incomes, the Center focuses on the intersection of poverty and housing discrimination. The Center also assists Connecticut homeowners who have been hit hardest by the nation’s ongoing foreclosure crisis.

Since 1994, the Connecticut Fair Housing Center has provided free investigative and legal services to residents who believe they have been the victims of housing discrimination. Because housing discrimination disproportionately affects people with low incomes, the Center focuses on the intersection of poverty and housing discrimination.

The Center also conducts statewide education and outreach to ensure that residents understand their fair housing rights. In addition, the Center works with state and local governments, housing professionals, and others to promote compliance with federal and state fair housing laws.

In 2008, in response to complaints from minority homeowners in what would eventually become the nation’s – and the state’s – home foreclosure crisis, the Center expanded its work to include foreclosure prevention, anti-predatory lending, and fair lending efforts.

In 2009, the Center initiated its Opportunity Project, drawing attention to the significant level of racial segregation in the state’s towns and cities. The Center commissioned a study by the Kirwan Institute which mapped communities of opportunity in Connecticut. The Center continues to research housing opportunity and housing discrimination in Connecticut and regularly publishes the findings in reports.

In 2015, we launched the Moving Forward project to empower Connecticut renters and homebuyers with the information and tools needed to find housing that best fits their needs while protecting their fair housing rights. 

The Center hosts an annual awards dinner, the Mildred and Richard Loving Civil Rights Award Dinner, at which state and national advocates, volunteer foreclosure prevention attorneys, and law firms that have provided the Center with extraordinary assistance in pro bono cases are recognized for their efforts on behalf of the Center’s clients and all Connecticut residents.

The Center is a statewide, private 501(c)3 nonprofit organization.