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An effort by Republican Sens. Christopher "Kit" Bond of Missouri and Richard Shelby of Alabama to prohibit housing authorities from using federal money for election-related activities is coming under fire this week. An NAACP memo accuses the senators of attempting to disenfranchise public housing residents by inserting a provision in the pending Department of Housing and Urban Development spending bill that would bar the use of public housing money for efforts such as voter registration. At the urging of Shelby, the language was put into the spending bill before the Senate passed it this year, but the provision didn't get much attention until this week, when House and Senate conferees are meeting to iron out differences on the bill. Congress is expected to approve the spending bill this week or next. Hilary Shelton, director of the NAACP Washington office, said his organization and its allies are lobbying to remove the wording because it would curtail efforts on behalf of elderly people and others who need voting assistance. "It is outrageous that senators from Alabama and Missouri would do something like this to make participation in elections harder for our most vulnerable citizens," he said. [more] and [more]