Title
Legal Representation for Eviction Hearings
Description
This report provides background for the City's growing interest in exploring legal representation for Phoenix residents who are involved in Civil Eviction Hearings, including policy supporting Right to Counsel legislation and funding.
THIS ITEM IS FOR INFORMATION AND DISCUSSION.
Report
Summary
In 2023, according to Maricopa County Justice Courts, Maricopa County received 83,236 eviction filings across 26 court facilities with an overwhelming majority of Phoenix residents being directly impacted and becoming at risk for homelessness. This represents a 23 percent increase from filings received in 2022. In January 2024 alone, landlords filed 8,025 eviction cases which puts 2024 on a path to exceed 2023 filings by another 15 percent.
The William E. Morris Institute for Justice reports in Maricopa County, 94 percent of landlords are represented by legal counsel at eviction hearings whereas less than one percent of tenants are represented. Research has shown that tenants experience disproportionately negative outcomes due to lack of representation, resulting in chronic housing insecurity, loss of wages, school absenteeism, and extensive costs to community-based services such as law enforcement and fire calls, emergency room visits, and behavior/mental health supports.
Right to Counsel (RTC) is a national movement to keep families in homes and protect tenants' due process rights by ensuring that every person facing eviction is assigned a lawyer to represent them in their eviction case. Currently, 17 cities and four states across the country have adopted RTC laws with impressive results. In Philadelphia, a city comparable in population to Phoenix, an estimated $3.5 million investment in RTC is expected to save the city over $45 million in annual savings. Baltimore is expecting to receive 100,000 eviction filings this year and planning to invest $6 million to yield over $17 million savings to their community.
In July 2020, the City of Phoenix Human Services Department implemented the Tenants Eviction Assistance Project (TEAP), in partnership with Community Legal Services. Services to low-income Phoenix residents include legal assistance, advocacy and representation at civil eviction hearings. Within the past three-and-a-half-years, the City has dedicated over $3.6 million in CARES Act, Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) and American Rescue Plan Act funding to provide legal services to nearly 8,300 cases, representing 16,000 Phoenix residents. Successful outcomes have included dismissal of eviction filings without prejudice, continuance of hearing to allow tenants more time to receive financial assistance, stay of hearings due to previous Center for Disease Control moratoriums, and cases being settled due to parties agreeing to fair arrangements between the tenant and landlord/owner or property management group.
Lessons learned to date include: rising evictions have become a public health crisis; when landlords know tenants have legal representation, they are less likely to file eviction cases for no reason; and RTC policies can affect power imbalances between tenants and landlords and reduce gender, race and socio-economic inequities. A change in power dynamics discourages landlords from weaponizing evictions against vulnerable populations.
Department
Responsible Department
This item is submitted by Deputy City Manager Gina Montes and the Human Services Department.