Protecting The Tenants From Homelessness

Protecting The Tenants From Homelessness

The Eviction Defense Center -- A Champion Of Low-Income Renters

By Lynda Carson 2/26/03

Oakland Ca-Oaklands Eviction Defense Center is a non-profit law firm that continues to champion the rights of the low-income renters, and continues to receive the respect and recognition of a grateful community.

Located downtown Oakland, at 1611 Telegraph Ave, Suite 726, the Eviction Defense Center (EDC) has become what many believe to be the best law firm in the country and northern California. It has been a success since they first opened their doors back in February of 1995, when tenants started to line up out in the hallways seeking legal representation to fight their evictions. The EDC case load quickly rose to 800 cases per year, and presently the EDC takes on more than 1400 eviction cases annually.

With a small staff headed by Anne Tamiko Omura as the Director of the EDC; Kristen Crowley is the Office Manager, Gina Amato is the Staff Attorney, and Trina Franklin is the Law Clerk.
In addition, theres 9 rotating volunteer attorneys who donate time and money to help keep this small law firm afloat as it offers legal representation to so many low-income renters.

Moving on recently after nearly 5 years with the EDC, staff member Alma Gutierrez was a familiar face helping out the tenants, and she shall be sorely missed, Ira Jacobowitz said.

As a community service, the EDC offers free legal advice over the phone, and remains very focused. A no frills operation. Unlike most other non-profits there are no glossy's promoting the EDC. Theres no time spent doing big fund raiseing events, no time taken up by grant writing, and they do all thats possible to minimize paperwork. The result is a very efficient vibrant team of people united to help out the poor, Omura said.

It's an integral part of Oakland and the East Bay, attorney Ken Greenstein said. Speaking glowingly of the EDC, Greenstein went on to say that no one out there is taking on so many cases to protect the renters, and that the EDC will be needed in the future.

East Bay landlords have a different view towards the EDC, and have repeatedly filed law-suits against them or the attorney's involved, in an effort to put them out of business once and for all. During one of several conversations with a RHANAC-Board Member; the low-income tenants need to move to Stockton or some other city that they can afford to live in, and that Oakland needs to subsidize the low-income renters so as to keep up with the escalating rents, Rick Philips said.

For many a year, in the blink of an eye the landlords and judges have had a field day tossing the low-income renters of Oakland out onto the streets. There was no justice to be found in a world where low-income renters lacked legal representation in the courts of the ruling class, designed and manipulated by the rich and powerful.

Like a buzz saw in a lumber mill awaiting the next log to roll in, the courts of Oakland and Alameda County chewed up and spit out the low-income renters before they knew what had hit them because the renters did not know how to present the documentation that may have been able to defend them. They lacked legal representation.

Then along came the Eviction Defense Center (EDC). A small group of idealists who were appalled by a judicial system that had no interest in the likes of the poor except to get rid of them as fast as possible. Individuals who for reasons of their own decided that such a system which was blatantly terrorizing the population, could not go on un-challenged.

Sometime during the fall of 1994, several meetings began to take place to explore ways to find a solution to the horrifying situation. A number of people became involved as founders of the EDC, including Ira Jacobowitz, Phil Rapier, John Murcko, Bill Simpage, David Shagam and Kenny Walton.

During that same period, Collective Legal Services being run by Katya Komisaruk and Cinthia Chandler already had a 501-3C, but, began to flounder, and a deal was made turn it over to the founders of the EDC.

Ira Jacobowitz was the first to donate a computer and other office equipment, and others donated amounts of money to get the office up and running. Hina Shah became the first managing director of the EDC, and was the one to figure out a sliding scale formula affordable to low-income renters that would be enough to keep the EDC up and running. The doors opened in February of 1995, and the immediate challenge was to find a way to reach the tenants needing legal representation in the courts.

A search of the municipal and county records turned up the names and addresses of those being evicted, and the EDC quickly started mailing out notices to the renters to let them know that they may obtain legal representation at the Eviction Defense Center, Bill Simpage said.

Word spread like wildfire, the tenants started showing up in droves at the EDC in hopes of getting legal representation, and the lines of people reached out into the hallways of the Latham Building. The EDC took off immediately, Jacobowitz said.

When the judges and landlords first got wind of what was going on, they became livid that this was all perfectly legal and that they had no way to stop the activists from reaching out to those in need. Eventually, masking laws were enacted, and now the court records of tenants being evicted are not available in the public records for the first 60 days after an unlawful detainer has been filed against them.

As the years rolled along, not everyone has the same memories of how the EDC began or managed to survive against the landlords with all of their money and high profile attorney's attacking the EDC in the courts. Through the years, the members of the Rental Housing Association of Nothern Alameda County (RHANAC) have railed against the EDC during their monthly meetings up at the Greek Orthodox Church, and some members have been known to angrily denounce the EDC as a communist plot out to get them by taking away the rights of property owners.

Fresh out of Boalt Hall Law School at the ripe old age of 25, Anne Tamiko Omura joined the EDC during December of1996 as the managing attorney for the law firm, and has been instrumental in taking the EDC to new levels of legal representation provided to the low-income renters. Omura see's a stable future for the EDC with no big changes on the horizon, and hopes to remain a part of the EDC so long as the need exists, said Omura.

The end goal would be to go out of business when poor people stopped getting evicted, and then to try to make some money through some other endeavor. Despite the passage of Measure EE, theres been only a slight decrease in the number of evictions and the EDC still has a full case load on a weekly basis, Omura said.

In a judicial system set up for the rich the impact of the EDC has been profound, and annoying not only to the landlords, but, to the judges in the court rooms who see the tireless efforts of the EDC on a daily basis.

For years, the judges have claimed that the EDC clogs the courts and tells them that they need to be more selective about the clients they take on, but, never seem to complain about the attorney's working for the landlords forcing the renters to defend themselves in court from the eviction for profit system, Omura said.

Indeed, on any given day the EDC may be up against an array of attorney's such as; Ed Nagy and THE EVICTORS, Vern Perry, Charles Ramsey, or Reeves and Seidler, who are all making their fortunes by making poor people homeless by dumping them upon the streets for the greedy landlords. The tenants of Oakland have been pushed around by the above for years, and are well aware of the terrorizing effects these notorius men have upon the lives of their families, loved ones, and friends.

On any given day, the cries and weeping of the evicted may be heard in the office of the EDC or in the hallways out side of the court rooms from many of the thousands who have no place left to go because the landlords manipulated the rents to such astronomical figures throughout the Bay Area.

There needs to be more Eviction Defense Centers set up across California and the country, attorney Bill Simpage said. The EDC only handles the cases of East Bay renters who manage to find them, while the majority of eviction cases end up in court with no legal representation for the renters. The key to ending this unfair system thats dumping the renters upon the streets, is to file the jury trial demand on time. This could bring the system to it's knees, Simpage said.

As one of the founders of the EDC, this all began for him back in 1994 when Judge Gifford was judicially beating up upon the renters and terrorizing them in his court room, Simpage said. It was alienating for the attorney's to fight alone in the courts and uniting with other attorney's to form the EDC made the movement against this form of tyranny become strong. Still taking on 5 to 10 housing cases a year, I pulled back from the EDC after being with them from 1995 till 1999, and left after experiencing burnout, Simpage said.

A graduate of New College with an office set up in San Francisco, attorney Ken Greenstein recalls first meeting attorney Ira Jacobowitz when he applied for the position of Office Manager/Law Clerk at the EDC, was hired in February of 1996 and remained through December of 1997. Ira Jacobowitz has been the back-bone of the EDC all these years, donating time & money, checking in everyday to see if he can help out, and by maintaining the printers and other equipment needed to run the office, Greenstein said.

During his career Ira Jacobowitz has done more than 50 trials, and Oakland tenants started to become aware of him as far back as 1989 or 1990, thanks in part to Doug Norman and the weekly or bi-weekly meetings held downtown Oakland by the Tenants Rights Project. Tenants could drop in with notices from their landlords, and learn what to do in the event that it was an unlawful detainer. Jacobowitz' name and phone number was given out to those in need of legal representation, and the others could wander off with a California Tenants hand book describing their rights and responsibilities under California law.

Members of the community who were very concerned about the state of affairs for the local renters joined together to form the EDC, and it's been a wonderful group of people to work with through the years, Jacobowitz went on to say. Because the attorney's united together, the EDC has been able to do more than 100 trials, Jacobowitz said.

Theres been some incredible victories and some spectacular defeats for the EDC, says Jacobowitz. During March of 2002, the EDC formed a contingent of 32 people who headed off to the U.S. Supreme Court for the case known as Rucker vs Davis in an effort to protect Oakland public housing tenants from the notorius "1 Strike Policy". In an 8-0 ruling, the court declared that the Oakland Housing Authority had legal grounds to evict the innocent public housing tenants for drug related crimes that they did not commit.

Despite the wins or losses of the EDC, tenants and attorney's alike speak fondly of the EDC. The EDC is an invaluable resource for me because they fill a gap that no one else does when I have to turn down so many clients seeking legal representation, attorney Leah Hess said.

While many of the EDC attorney's speak fondly of each other and the tenants they serve, some believe that Ira Jacobowitz has been modest about his accomplishments. On the other hand, Jacobowitz believes that John Murcko has been the most prolific member of the group, and speaks fondly of David Shagam the secretary of the board who was there from the begining and during the next 4 years. Others speak highly of Phil Rapier, as others speak fondly of Bill Simpage and it's obvious that the friendships between this group reach deeply to bond them all together through the years.

In a birthday toast to Anne Tamiko Omura for her courage and stamina to run the EDC, last summer (2002) at least 28 friends and attorney's joined her one evening at Le Chevall's for her birthday celebration as they all took turns to share stories about their experiences with the Eviction Defense Center.

Over and over again through the years, the renters have joined all of these attorney's for many
protests out on the streets of Oakland or in City Hall, and many feel that they are friends with Bob Salinas, Phil Rapier, Anne Tamiko Omura, Ira Jacobowitz, Bill Simpage, Ken Greenstein, John Murcko, Roxanne Romel, Leah Hess, and the rest of the attorney's who have remained accessible to them during their time of need.

The Eviction Defense Center can be reached at 510/452-4541. My sincere apologies to any one that I may have left out or could not reach before the deadline of this story.