The regional housing affordability crisis leaves hundreds of households facing eviction each month. The Law Foundation provides free legal services to low-income families and individuals at risk of eviction and homelessness with the goal of helping them maintain safe and healthy housing within our community. Our clients receive caring and competent representation when navigating issues like unfair evictions, housing discrimination, or preserving rental subsidies and assistance.
HOUSING
The Power of Partnerships: Disabled Seniors Avoid Homelessness
Alex, a senior living with a disability, was facing imminent eviction from his home. A notice from the sheriff had been posted on Alex’s door: next week he and his wife would be forced to leave. He had missed a deadline in his eviction process and was struggling to follow up with the court. Alex lives with severe disabilities while also caring for his disabled wife. Most likely they would not have the time or physical ability to bring anything with them except the most essential belongings. And where would they even go?
Thanks to the Law Foundation team’s advocacy and strong community partnerships, Alex connected to our office through the San Jose Eviction Help Center. We prepared paperwork and accompanied Alex to court to ask the judge for more time before the eviction could be executed. While working to help Alex and his wife secure new housing, we discovered that the eviction order was visible on his public record–a significant barrier when applying for new housing. We arranged for the eviction to be temporarily “masked” from public view, per state law. These legal interventions allowed Alex and his wife to secure and move into new housing without experiencing any time unhoused. Both Alex and his wife can now focus on their health knowing they once again have a safe and stable place to call home.
Our Housing team often works with government agencies, nonprofits, and social workers to provide holistic services for our clients. Together we improve the tools necessary to increase the stability and quality of life for our low-income neighbors.
Bridging the Housing Service Gap in South Santa Clara County
The Law Foundation is the only full-representation legal services organization in the rural communities in Southern Santa Clara County, including the cities of Gilroy, San Martin, and Morgan Hill (“South County”.) The services we provide to these rural communities with large Latino populations include eviction defense, tenants’ rights education, and tenant organizing.
South County was one of the hardest-hit areas during the pandemic. Today, as emergency tenant protections have ended, people are struggling to stay afloat and remain housed in the communities they have always known, where they receive health and other safety net services, and where their children go to school. And the impacts are felt disproportionately by renters of color. Gilroy residents are 59% Latino, more than double that of the County overall. Additionally, 43% of the population is low-income, and half of the residents spend more than half of their income on housing costs.
There is a desperate need for dedicated legal services and organizing in this rural region of Santa Clara County. It is a mobilization desert. We have unearthed stories of landlords threatening to report undocumented immigrant tenants, rents being raised 17% in a year, and buildings being kept below habitable standards. There are fewer tenant protections in the area and residents do not expect they can come to San Jose and get services.
The Law Foundation responded to this need by partnering with Community Agency for Resources, Advocacy and Services (CARAS), a Gilroy-based organization dedicated to providing culturally competent services to youth and families in South County. Our expert team of attorneys and advocates, in partnership with CARAS, have increased tenant organizing capacity, enhanced community education on tenants and mobile homeowners’ rights, and streamlined legal service delivery to Spanish-speaking renters who may otherwise be unrepresented. Our work to increase access to legal resources in South County is a powerful tool against mounting displacement in our diverse community.
Our Housing team has been actively involved in this region for years and we plan to continue expanding. With services offered in multiple languages, we strive to break down barriers and make our support accessible to all.
Preserving Funding for Permanent Affordable Housing in San Jose
In spring 2023, the Law Foundation joined dozens of community organizations in speaking up to preserve funding for affordable housing. This included speaking at San Jose City Council hearings and participating in demonstrations at City Hall.
Passed by voters in 2020, San Jose’s Measure E taxes real estate purchases over $2 million to provide affordable housing for the city’s low-income and unhoused residents. There was a proposal to redirect about $25 million of these voter-approved funds to emergency shelter, rather than permanent housing solutions for which the funds were intended and that this region needs.
Our advocacy efforts and legal know-how worked to preserve real, lasting housing solutions–and protect the voice of the voters. The City Council voted against the proposal to gut Measure E funding for emergency housing and instead approved a compromise budget that preserves most of those dollars for permanent affordable housing, as the voters intended. Fighting for long-term solutions like this helps combat rising homelessness and housing instability that affect the clients we work with every day.
The Law Foundation regularly uses policy advocacy to change the systems that create social and racial inequity. We work tirelessly to ensure that every person in our thriving region is granted the same rights and legal access.