• Source: Tenant right to counsel

Tenant right to counsel (TRTC) guarantees that eligible tenants will be provided legal representation, especially when tenants face eviction. Without a right to counsel, tenants are represented by lawyers around 3% of the time on average, whereas landlords have legal representation in 84% of cases. TRTC is viewed as a form of homelessness prevention, but eviction potentially implicates a number of other basic human needs, such as child custody, education, employment, and physical/mental health. Generally, tenant right to counsel programs are successful, resulting in lower eviction rates and more time, reduced rent arrears, and a sealed eviction record for tenants for those who cannot or do not want to stay in their homes.




Around the world






= United Kingdom

=
On 1 August 2023, the Housing Loss Prevention Advice Service launched in England and Wales, providing free legal representation and advice regardless of income for renters and homeowners who are facing illegal eviction, poor housing conditions, and late rent or mortgage payments. The program was expected to assist 38,000 people per year.




= United States

=

Unlike criminal right to counsel, there is no federal tenant right to counsel. Evictions and landlord-tenant cases are civil cases. The theoretical expansion of right to counsel to civil cases was at one time known as "Civil Gideon," after Gideon v. Wainwright, which established the right to an appointed lawyer in criminal cases for defendants who cannot afford one, but advocates have moved away from that term in favor of "civil right to counsel".
In the US, tenant right to counsel was first passed in New York City in 2017. It has passed in 17 cities as of September 2024, including San Francisco, Kansas City, and Philadelphia.
TRTC is a common goal for tenants unions. KC Tenants, Bozeman Tenants United, North Carolina Tenants Union, and others have pushed for free legal representation for renters at local and statewide levels.




Impact


The National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel has collected tenant right to counsel impact data, including:

In New York City, 84% of represented tenants stayed in their homes;
In Maryland, 76% of tenant households provided full representation avoided disruptive displacement, and tenants received more than $415,000 in housing judgments and avoided more than $4.5 million in direct costs
In Kansas City, 86% of represented tenants stayed in their units with no eviction record.




See also


Right to counsel
Landlord-tenant law
Civil rights




References

Kata Kunci Pencarian:

• Tenant right to counsel
• Dean Preston
• Kansas City Tenants Union
• Bozeman Tenants United
• Tenants union
• The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
• TRTC
• Gideon v. Wainwright
• Legal aid
• Landlord–tenant law