Page 32 - Impact: Collected Essays on Expanding Access to Justice

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People’s relationship with eviction isn’t just in the courts . The very real threat of eviction looms every time they think about calling the city to report housing code violations, withholding rent for lack of repairs, forming a tenants’ association or exercising their rights . Having rights and knowing those rights enables people to take action . If tenants knew that housing court was a place to find justice, if they knew they’d have an attorney to represent them, they’d be more likely to report housing code violations, form a tenants’ association, file an overcharge complaint and even take their landlord to court . We would see an incredible change in the primary function of housing court as well as a change in tenant organizing and activism . This new balance of power would make our city safer—it was tenant organizing that helped and continues to help shape laws about code violations that keep all New Yorkers safe . Every time a tenant doesn’t report a maintenance or building code violation, like a gas leak, because they are afraid of being evicted, we are all at risk .
As New York City gets closer to the levels of funding needed to provide a full Right to Counsel, how we do it is just as important as what we do . The earlier example of Traffic Court presents us with a challenge . How do we institutionalize justice? How do we make it so that all tenants leave court feeling like their voices were heard and their rights were protected? If we implement Right to Counsel, will we do it in a way that respects the full dignity of everyone who is faced with the challenge of going to housing court? Will we do it in a way that teaches people that our city’s courts are a place of justice, dignity, fairness and respect? Will we teach tenants that they are equal citizens under the law? Will we teach them that they have rights that our courts and our city respect and uphold? Will we teach them that they have a place in our society to fight for their rights?
If so, then Right to Counsel needs to be fully funded . It needs to be phased in so that the providers have the capacity they need and so that tenants are well informed . It needs to be done in consultation with an incredible and diverse coalition of academics, tenant organizers, activists and attorneys who have been working on these issues for the better part of a generation—the Right to Counsel NYC Coalition .
If we don’t do it this way, if we throw money at the problem without a comprehensive strategy and plan, outcomes might be better for some tenants, but they will still learn that they are second class citizens as they navigate one new bureaucracy to access free legal services after the other . Many tenants won’t be affected at all, because they will never make it to court .
Right to Counsel cannot just be about meeting numbers—numbers of cases represented, numbers of people served, numbers of homes protected, numbers of dollars saved for every dollar invested, numbers of shelter residents reduced . Those are important numbers, but they cannot be the goal of this initiative . How people are treated must be at the foundation of this—as it is at the foundation of the movement for a Right to Counsel .
Increased funding increases the pool of people who get lucky . By contrast, a fully funded and a well implemented Right to Counsel, is a strong step forward in the path towards institutionalizing justice . •
Impact: Collected Essays on Expanding Access to Justice