Blog: Eviction

We are pleased to share that Carl Sessions, a recent graduate of ITT Chicago-Kent School of Law, has returned to LCBH as an Equal Justice Works (EJW) Fellow, sponsored by the Rossotti Family Foundation.

During two student volunteer stints with LCBH, Carl saw firsthand the inequities of representations in eviction court.

A key finding from LCBH’s Chicago Evictions data portal has revealed that 79% of landlords appeared with legal counsel though only 11% of tenants were represented.

More importantly, Carl witnessed improved outcomes for tenants that LCBH was able to assist.

"The truth comes out when you have advocates with equal skills on both sides of a case," Carl shares.

Based on these observations as well as the desire to combine his legal interests with community organizing and mobilization, Carl developed a fellowship project that serves two functions:

LBCH welcomes Katilin Cutshaw, an Indiana University Maurer School of Law graduate and alum of Teach for America (TFA), as an Equal Justice Works (EJW) Fellow.

During her TFA training, Kaitlin explored the historical causes of student achievement gaps, with access to housing as an important contributing factor. Her efforts as a LCBH law student volunteer further connected those dots.

"My understanding of student displacement and how it disrupts a child’s education solidified here at LCBH," Kaitlin shares.

With the help of our staff, she created her EJW project proposal to develop a school-based clinic that offers housing-focused legal aid with the help of pro bono volunteers.

Kaitlin hopes to reach out to schools in the Austin and South Shore neighborhoods, two areas of Chicago with high rates of eviction as well as rising housing costs, although any school with high risk of student displacement would be a potential candidate.

The City of Chicago’s Committee on Housing and Real Estate met today. The agenda included a quarterly progress report on the Department of Housing’s 5-year housing plan. Mark Swartz, LCBH’s Executive Director, provided the following statement on Chicago’s ongoing eviction problem:

Good Afternoon. My name is Mark Swartz and I am the Executive Director of Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing.

As we embark upon the new 5-year Housing Plan, I want to address the topic of eviction both as a driver of displacement of our most vulnerable citizens as well a threat to the Plan’s principals of diversity and equity between and among our communities. I also want to share with you a resource that LCBH designed to help understand Chicago’s eviction landscape.

On May 16 of this year, LCBH launched the Chicago Evictions data portal along with a series of 3 reports highlighting some of the impacts eviction has had on the City. The data show that since 2010, on average, there have been just over 23,000 evictions in Chicago each year – that’s about 1 in 25 renters and their families each year who are facing eviction.

LCBH's new Chicago Evictions data portal, https://eviction.lcbh.org, was released Thursday, May 16, before some 200 supporters of the organization, advocates, policymakers, and others at Austin Town Hall Park, 5610 W. Lake St. Based on Chicago residential eviction court records filed during the calendar years of 2010-2017 with the Circuit Court of Cook County, the portal’s unveiling was supported by a grant from Polk Bros. Foundation.

"Being in eviction court has consequences way beyond losing an apartment," says Mark Swartz, executive director of LCBH, the only legal aid agency in the Chicago area advocating solely for renters since 1980. "Our data highlight a series of problems we must solve if the city is to have decent, fair and affordable housing – and help point the way toward some of those solutions, as well."

One example of a consequence is that eviction filings make it difficult for tenants to find a new apartment even if the filing does not result in eviction, due to the way tenant screening services currently use eviction filing data.