{"id":403461,"date":"2019-04-21T02:13:38","date_gmt":"2019-04-21T01:13:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/right-to-counsel-programs-prevent-evictions\/"},"modified":"2019-04-21T02:13:38","modified_gmt":"2019-04-21T01:13:38","slug":"right-to-counsel-programs-prevent-evictions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/right-to-counsel-programs-prevent-evictions\/","title":{"rendered":"Right-to-Counsel Programs Prevent Evictions"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>Even if you\u2019ve never faced eviction proceedings, you can probably imagine they are stressful.<\/p>\n<p>Depending on the state, landlords may have a tremendous amount of power over tenants, who have limited recourse in some courts. Plus, because eviction is a civil (not criminal) legal matter, there\u2019s no legally enshrined right to counsel. If you don\u2019t have an attorney and cannot afford one, one will not be appointed for you. Instead, you have to go it alone.<\/p>\n<p>Dealing with the justice system can be an expensive and confusing proposition. And for low-income people, the challenges of navigating the system in cases like evictions are especially challenging, thanks to limited financial resources and a lack of understanding \u2014 one reason legal aid organizations exist. But these groups can\u2019t meet all the need. In 2017,<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lsc.gov\/what-legal-aid\/unmet-need-legal-aid\">62 percent to 72 percent of people<\/a><span> <\/span>who asked for legal aid couldn\u2019t get it due to staffing shortages, limitations on the assistance available and other factors.<\/p>\n<div class=\"truth-post-content-high  inline-callout-container\" id=\"truth-550288830\">\n<div class=\"truth-post-content-high\" id=\"truth-2064044239\">\n<aside class=\" callout inline-callout callout--subscribe callout--dark\" id=\"truth-982240125\">\n<h2>Stay in the loop<\/h2>\n<p>Never miss the news and analysis you care about.<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>That\u2019s where the<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.righttocounselnyc.org\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">right to counsel<\/a><span> <\/span>movement comes in. Civil rights advocates argue that being poor shouldn\u2019t be a crime \u2014 or grounds for being stripped of property and liberty. But often, the lack of an attorney means low-income people are treated unfairly in court. This is especially true with evictions. The Right to Counsel NYC Coalition says about<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.righttocounselnyc.org\/faq\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">50 percent of evictions<\/a><span> <\/span>would be preventable with an attorney.<\/p>\n<p>The New York City Council passed a law in 2017 to<span> <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/nycprogressives.com\/2017\/07\/20\/new-york-city-council-passes-right-to-counsel-legislation\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">extend the right to counsel<\/a><span> <\/span>to people facing eviction, foreclosure and certain other housing-related cases in court \u2014 saying low-income people would be provided publicly funded attorneys if they needed assistance. In much the same way that public defenders help even the playing field \u2014 or would if they weren\u2019t dealing with an overwhelming caseload \u2014 these attorneys can keep people in their homes. From a purely practical perspective, it\u2019s very cost-effective to provide&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/truthout.org\/articles\/right-to-counsel-programs-prevent-evictions\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Even if you\u2019ve never faced eviction proceedings, you can probably imagine they are stressful. Depending on the state, landlords may have a tremendous amount of power over tenants, who have limited recourse in some courts. Plus, because eviction is a civil (not criminal) legal matter, there\u2019s no legally enshrined right to counsel. If you don\u2019t [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-403461","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=403461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403461\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}