Community members decide how a housing trust fund is used. One idea is to create rental apartments for low-income families. San Joaquin County lacks affordable homes for 24,360 low-income households. (San Joaquin County Housing Report)
California will receive $126 million from the federal government in 2021 for local housing trust funds. (NHTF 2021 State Allocations)
Areas with high rent burden rates typically have higher eviction rates.
Evictions have long-lasting consequences.
Families are displaced from their community and children have to switch schools. Families often lose their belongings, which can be expensive to replace. Sometimes eviction leads to homelessness, especially in areas that lack affordable homes.
Evictions can prevent a family from finding decent housing because many landlords screen for recent evictions. (Brookings & Eviction Lab)
Black renters are targeted by evictions at a higher rate than white renters.
In San Joaquin County, only 1% of tenants have legal representation in eviction cases, compared to 67% of landlords. (Evicted in San Joaquin)
Landlords have the upper-hand in eviction cases because they typically have legal counsel. Some landlords are serial evictors. (ACLU)
The first-year evaluation of San Francisco’s Right to Counsel program found a 10% reduction in eviction lawsuit filings from 2018 to 2019 and an increase in housing stability among tenants as a result of having access to legal representation (67% were able to remain in their homes). (National Coalition for Right to Counsel)
