‘$200M gone lickety split’: Federal investigation targets race-based WA housing program

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is launching an investigation into the race-based Washington housing program, which essentially awards money for races that were discriminated against dating back to 1968. HUD believes this violates the 1968 Fair Housing Law because the money is being distributed to one group, but not another.

Carleen Johnson from Center Square joined “The John Curley Show” on KIRO Newsradio to explain the reasoning behind the investigation initially highlighted by Corey Orvold, and why there may have been some questionable allocations of funds within the program.

“HUD announced yesterday that they’re specifically targeting, through the Washington Housing Finance Commission, the covenant home ownership program, which is race-based,” Johnson said. “The thing that Orvold got involved with, which is like the Tacoma Urban League, Seattle Urban League, giving out all this money if you’re black. Basically, those programs are only for if you’re black.”

Whistleblower exposes family connections in fund distribution

Orvold raised concerns after discovering family connections between program administrators and those receiving the benefits.

“I started digging into it, and started to see the pictures of like, Asia Williams, whose mother is Angela Williams, the Director of Financial Empowerment at the Urban League,” Orvold said. “And then I started asking, ‘Are you related?’ Angela Williams, is Celeste Paul your cousin? Yes, Celeste Paul, the real estate broker, is my cousin. It just kept going from there.

“It didn’t appear that those individuals had any problems getting their clients through,” Orvold continued. “For us as real estate brokers, it’s a huge liability if I don’t tell my clients about these programs, even though I question the validity of them, I question, you know, the organization that’s doling out the money.”

Johnson emphasized the suspicious speed at which the program’s funds seemingly disappeared, and why HUD may eventually rework the program.

“Orville was like, ‘I have some clients of mine who want to get a piece of the action, why is the money always gone every time they apply?'” Johnson said. “So she got off the board and turned whistleblower. My suspicion is that HUD is now looking at covenant home ownership, and thinking, wait a minute, you’re going to give to people that have black skin, and certain racial groups, but no, Jewish people, you’re out. Japanese people, don’t care. They’re going to probably end up expanding this after they find what I think they’re going to find.”

$200 million disappears as other qualified applicants were denied

Johnson spoke to the courage Orvold had in coming forward, which resulted in death threats due to her actions.

“[Orville] has put her life literally on the line. She has gotten many death threats. The AG’s office is finally paying attention to her, although they won’t tell me anything about their investigations. She is the definition of what a pure whistleblower is. She stepped off the board because she saw some shenanigans going on and thought, ‘This is not what I believe this program to be.’

“$200 million was the initial investment of taxpayer money for the community reinvestment program, the one that Orville has been blowing the horn about for the last almost a year now, $200 million, and it was gone lickety split,” Johnson continued. “If you tell me that based on the color of my skin and the fact that I’ve got a couple of previous generations here, I can get a home loan and probably get it forgiven in five years, heck yeah, I’m signing up.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

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