Lawrence Tenants, a citywide tenant union, rallied support at a town hall Saturday for a delayed program meant to provide legal representation for people facing eviction.

In March 2024, Lawrence and Douglas County set a goal to establish a tenant right to counsel for those facing evictions in Douglas County as part of the joint “A Place For Everyone” plan to end chronic homelessness. Establishing a tenant right to counsel would ensure tenants are provided with legal representation when facing eviction. 

The Douglas County Commission has delayed the implementation of tenant right to counsel for more than a year, but commissioners plan to hear an update on the program during their Wednesday, March 25 meeting. Commissioners Erica Anderson, Gene Dorsey and Patrick Kelly were present at Saturday’s town hall.

Lemmy Hughs led the group through an exercise meant to mimic the real-life experience many tenants go through of facing eviction with minimal financial options, limited time and a confusing list of resources. 

Each person was given a set of circumstances they are living through, including a three-day eviction notice. 

Various stations around the room offered different plans for support. People could bounce between stations representing talking to your landlord, applying for emergency rental assistance, seeking out legal support, finding loans or selling personal items. 

People said they appreciated that the exercise was realistic and made them feel real emotions of facing eviction: anger, fear, exhaustion, stress. 

“It brought tears to my eyes,” Kari Lang said. “This process, it sucks.”

Others pointed out how it replicated real issues in rental assistance resources. Nonprofits have tight budgets, and legal services have long wait lists. After waiting in long lines during the exercise, only a few people were granted emergency assistance. Most people failed to scrounge up enough money in the activity to cover their rent, even after selling cars, cats and kidneys. 

This segued into the day’s main discussion on a tenant right to counsel. People said it would be helpful to not be alone navigating the scary situation of facing eviction. 

“It feels less daunting when you have someone in your corner,” Lindsay Love said. 

Gabi Sprague said the program can help keep people housed by providing renters with a lawyer who can dispute facts of an eviction case, find solutions outside of court and ensure due process.

The program is currently implemented in 20 cities, including Kansas City, where it has decreased evictions. 

“It’s time for the county commission to act,” Sprague said. 

Lawrence Tenants also want the county to create an oversight committee made up of tenants. 

“We are doing a lot of work to make sure that we live in a world where housing is actually a human right,” Sprague said. 

The county commission will meet to discuss TRTC again Wednesday. County staff members are recommending a pilot program to help tenants avoid eviction by giving them access to legal help using $40,000 already in the budget for eviction prevention, according to the meeting agenda.

The county would pay nonprofit legal groups, like Kansas Legal Services or Kansas Holistic Defenders, to give legal advice and provide partial or full representation in eviction cases. Staff members are estimating about 80 people would get legal help during the pilot.

Commissioners will consider whether to ask staff to start designing the pilot program. 

The county commission will meet at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 25 in the commission chamber of the historic courthouse, 1100 Massachusetts St.

See the full meeting agenda at this link. People may give public comment in person or virtually via Zoom; find the Zoom link on this page.

‘No landlords’

Lawrence Tenants began the meeting by going over some ground rules. The first was that no landlords were allowed.

The group pointed attention to the presence of James Dunn, president of Landlords of Lawrence. The group of local landlords previously sued the City of Lawrence over an ordinance that bans discrimination against tenants based on their source of income. 

The Kansas House this week passed a bill that would bar cities from passing laws that require landlords to accept vouchers. The law targets Lawrence, which is the only city in Kansas with protections for renters’ source of income. The bill was supported by The Associated Landlords of Kansas, which Dunn helps lead. 

Lawrence Tenants booed Dunn and asked him to leave multiple times, but he declined, saying it was a public meeting. 

Dunn said in an interview after the meeting he wanted more collaboration between landlords and renters. He’s been to multiple Lawrence Tenants meetings, he said.  

“They don’t want to understand,” Dunn said. “They don’t get the other side. They don’t get the other side that a lot of times the landlord is pressured by the tenants to get disruptive, noisy people out.”

He said most evictions are due to a failure to pay rent, and judges are often sympathetic to renters’ cases and want to avoid evictions. 

Dunn did not participate in the group’s activities. 

Cuyler Dunn (he/him), a contributor to The Lawrence Times since April 2022, is a student at the University of Kansas School of Journalism. He is a graduate of Lawrence High School where he was the editor-in-chief of the school’s newspaper, The Budget, and was named the 2022 Kansas High School Journalist of the Year. Read his complete bio here. Read more of his work for the Times here.

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