The recent extension of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s eviction moratorium is often interpreted as a sign that evictions will come to a screeching halt. However, the more realistic outcome has been that landlords and property owners have used plenty of legal methods to circumvent the order. While these owners often have the necessary resources to hire legal counsel, a vast majority of tenants don’t have their own legal advocate. In Houston, only 3% of tenants in eviction cases had attorney representation. A coalition of eviction defenders, comprised of Lone Star Legal Aid, Houston Volunteer Lawyers, South Texas College of Law, Thurgood Marshall School of Law’s Earl Carl Institute, and the University of Houston Law Center, are offering a pilot program to combat the rising need for legal advocates in civil law. The program, Eviction Right 2 Counsel, is the first of its kind and provides any applicant full representation in court.
Read more on why such a program, and others like it in the nation, have become imperative in fighting injustice during an ongoing pandemic:
Lone Star Legal Aid is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit law firm focused on advocacy on behalf of low-income and underserved populations. Lone Star Legal Aid serves millions of people at 125% of federal poverty guidelines that reside in 72 counties in the eastern and Gulf Coast regions of Texas, and 4 counties of southwest Arkansas. Lone Star Legal Aid focuses its resources on maintaining, enhancing, and protecting income and economic stability; preserving housing; improving outcomes for children; establishing and sustaining family safety and stability, health and well‐being; and assisting populations with special vulnerabilities, like those who have disabilities, or who are elderly, homeless, or have limited English language skills. To learn more about Lone Star Legal Aid, visit our website at http://www.lonestarlegal.org.
Media contact: media@lonestarlegal.org
