A single parent renting a home was harassed for months by the landlord after their paperwork was lost when the rental property was transferred from one owner to the next. The tenant was being evicted through no fault of their own, and neither the former property owner nor the current property owner took any responsibility for the situation. Finally, after months of back and forth, the eviction case was dismissed and the tenant’s ledger brought fully up to date at no further cost to that tenant. The client received the full credit for the thousands of dollars in rent that the landlord had been improperly trying to collect from them.

A Tennessee resident reached out seeking help with an eviction their previous landlord erroneously reported on their credit report after they voluntarily vacated. The client was provided with the resources and guidance they needed to contest the report with both the landlord and the credit reporting agencies. Getting this eviction removed from their credit report will remove a potentially insurmountable barrier in the event they ever need to rehome in the wake of a disaster.

Both of the above scenarios represent real life legal issues faced by low-income Tennesseans over the past year and successful resolutions brought about by Equal Justice Works Fellows hosted by Tennessee Alliance for Legal Services (TALS). The need for free, civil legal services continues to grow at exponential rates. Results of the 2014 Tennessee Legal Needs Assessment reveal that over 60% of the state’s low-income population experienced at least one civil legal problem during the previous year but only 37.1% of those households were able to take any legal action.¹

Housing is one of the most fundamental of human needs but in many areas of Tennessee, housing options are scarce and very expensive. Maintaining safe, habitable housing from threats of eviction and natural disasters is a very real challenge that many Tennesseans face every single day. Data from Princeton University’s Eviction Lab estimates that as many as 6 in 100 renting households face eviction filings or the threat of eviction each year, and as many as 1 in 40 lose their housing annually.² The Eviction Lab national data also indicates that only 3% of tenants facing eviction have the benefit of legal representation compared to 81% of landlords who are represented by legal counsel.³

Natural disasters can further exacerbate existing housing and legal issues. In 2022 alone, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates that natural disasters cost the United States $165 billion dollars and resulted in the loss of 474 lives.⁴ Unfortunately, there is historically a distinct lack of free civil legal services available after a natural disaster.

TALS recognized the need for additional assistance in the housing and disaster resilience practice areas. Enter the Equal Justice Works Fellows program.⁵ TALS has partnered with Tomi Robb, a recent University of Tennessee College of Law graduate, to create a program centered around reducing intergenerational poverty through improving housing stability and by providing additional legal services including expungements that can increase household income for clients. TALS also partnered with Nick Gau, a recent Belmont University College of Law graduate, to improve and strengthen disaster resilience legal services in Tennessee.

Robb is a two-year Equal Justice Works fellow who is generously sponsored by International Paper and the Tennessee Bar Foundation and has an office at the Gallatin location of the Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the Cumberlands. Gau is participating in a one-year Equal Justice Works fellowship that is dedicated to helping communities prepare for and respond to disasters and provide legal services throughout all phases of a disaster, including preparedness, mitigation, response and recovery.

Robb came on board as EJW Fellow in September 2021. Even though Robb is a very recently barred Tennessee attorney, she has taken the EJW Fellowship program vision of addressing unmet needs to heart. She has shown passion, dedication, legal knowledge and expertise that far exceed her years as a practicing attorney. Since her time as an EJW Fellow, Robb has helped clients obtain over $195,000 in COVID-19 rental relief program funds for clients in local counties. She has personally handled more than 100 landlord/tenant cases, including representing clients in eviction proceedings. Robb has provided education and outreach events for legal services providers, access to justice partners and the community. She organized and hosted a community expungement event where over 250 charges were expunged and removed barriers to income stability for these clients.

The Equal Justice Works Disaster Resilience Fellowship Program is funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Center for Disaster Philanthropy, the American Red Cross and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The overall goal of the Disaster Resilience Program is to ensure that legal services are equitably accessible before, during and after a disaster. Gau joined TALS in December 2022. TALS, in conjunction with a number of partners, including the American Bar Association Young Lawyers Division and the Tennessee Bar Association Young Lawyers Division, operates the Disaster Legal Helpline that is activated after a federal disaster declaration in Tennessee. The Disaster Legal Helpline, staffed by volunteer attorneys, provides free civil and legal advice to survivors of natural disasters. Gau has worked diligently to provide legal services to the survivors of the 2021 tornadoes and has made connections with community partners to raise awareness about the legal services available in the aftermath of a natural disaster.

With the brilliant assistance of the two Equal Justice Works Fellows, TALS is able to further its mission of strengthening the delivery of civil legal help to vulnerable Tennesseans and its vision of increasing and improving equal access to justice in Tennessee.  |||

NOTES

1. Tennessee Alliance for Legal Services. “2014 Statewide Legal Needs Assessment.” November 2014. www.tncourts.gov/sites/default/files/docs/2014_legalneeds_report_1.pdf. (The 2014 legal needs study was conducted by the University of Tennessee College of Social Work, Office of Research and Public Service. Financial support for the 2014 study was provided by a grant from the Ansley Fund of the Frist Foundation.)

2. Eviction Lab. “New Data Release Shows that 3.6 Million Eviction Cases were Filed in the United States in 2018.” http://bit.ly/41tRQTH. July 11, 2022.

3. Eviction Lab. “Eviction Diversion: Preventing Eviction Before Going to Court.” https://evictionlab.org/eviction-diversion. Sept. 2, 2021.

4. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). “U.S Billon-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters (2023).” www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions (last visited April 19, 2023).

5. Equal Justice Works. www.equal
justiceworks.org (last visited April 19, 2023).