HUD to tackle insurance redlining. (Department of Housing and Urban Development)

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) plans to appoint a task force and a special enforcement unit to eliminate insurance industry redlining practices in inner cities. HUD Asst Sec Roberta Achtenberg acknowledged that redlining is not always intentional, but that the Title VIII Fair Housing Act section of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 declares that any use of discriminatory practices in marketing insurance or mortgages is illegal. Achtenberg termed insurance redlining a blocking of economic empowerment and blamed HUD's failure to take anti-redlining actions on the George Bush