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Nearly half of the Antioch Police Department was temporarily \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\">placed on leave, the chief resigned, and the officers’ racial bias\u003c/a> tainted dozens of criminal cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amiri, Rombough and Wenger’s use of force against plaintiffs Jessie Wilson and Dajon Smith was allegedly \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947876/antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years\">part of a years-long pattern\u003c/a> in which they planned and carried out excessive force against minorities, especially Black people, according to the federal lawsuit filed Wednesday in the Northern District of California. The officers allegedly referred to their targets as “gorillas,” among other derogatory language.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the incidents in question against Wilson and Smith took place in 2021, it’s only because of the unearthed text messages that they have the evidence they need to sue, their attorney Fulvio Cajina told KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The reason we’re bringing this lawsuit now is because we didn’t have the information to bring this lawsuit before,” Cajina said. “It’s only because of the FBI investigation into the Antioch Police Department that we know that there was a conspiracy amongst officers to target minorities and to intentionally violate their civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cajina said the text messages are “sickening.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch Police Department and city attorney did not respond to requests for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Much of the officers’ planning was carried out in text messages revealed by the FBI probe in which they frequently described the desire to beat people and allow Purcy, their K-9 unit, to bite them, according to the lawsuit. In February 2019, Rombough texted Amiri, “Yeah buddy we gonna f— some people up,” court documents showed. They discussed revenge for someone “f—ing with [an officer],” and Amiri texted Rombough, “blood for blood.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2021, an officer texted Amiri to ask about his interaction with a suspect. Amiri responded, “lol putting a pistol in someone’s mouth and telling them to stop stealing isn’t illegal.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wilson was injured on Aug. 24, 2021, when Antioch police officers, including Amiri and Rombough, executed a search warrant to enter an Antioch residence, then entered Wilson’s locked room while he was sitting on an air mattress playing video games, according to the lawsuit. An unnamed officer pinned Wilson’s left arm down against his bed, and Rombough shot him with a 40mm less-lethal launcher, according to the indictment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A less-lethal launcher fires bean bags or sponge bullets and is intended to be used in crowd control environments, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.lesslethal.com/products/37mm-40mm/alstac-40-detail\">the website of Pacem Defense\u003c/a>, a company selling this type of launcher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rombough’s report about the incident differed from those written by other officers. An unnamed sergeant wrote to Rombough to critique his report, “you write that [Wilson] didn’t comply, but he clearly had his hands up at first. You need to describe way better what happened,” according to the suit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label='Related Coverage' tag='antioch-police-department']When Antioch Police Department superiors became aware of the officers’ misdeeds, they helped them avoid discipline and accountability by concealing their actions in police reports, the suit alleges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith, a Black transgender woman, encountered the officers after she allegedly stole a Maserati on Oct. 26, 2021. The incident can be seen in officer-worn body camera footage \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/12/03/antioch-releases-video-of-officers-shooting-less-lethal-round-at-transgender-woman-whose-hands-were-raised/\">obtained by the Bay Area News Group\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police officers, including Wenger, surrounded Smith and the Maserati at an Antioch grocery store. Smith came out of the vehicle and faced the officers. Wenger can be heard saying to another officer, “You got the 40?” meaning the less-lethal launcher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith stood by the vehicle with her hands up, and Wenger shot her in the chest with a 40mm less-lethal launcher. Antioch police officers are trained that the chest is a “potentially lethal” area to shoot someone with a 40mm less-lethal round, according to the suit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Smith begins to recoil in pain, the officers pin her to the ground and sic their police dog on her. The dog can be seen in the video tearing skin from her left arm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rombough collected photos of people he injured shooting the 40mm less-lethal launcher and told Antioch police officers he was collecting the launcher’s spent munitions to craft an American flag, using the munitions as stars and stripes, the suit alleges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Similarly, Amiri shared photos of victims bitten by their K9, Purcy. After one such bite in 2019, Amiri texted, “I’m gonna take more gory pics. gory [sic] pics are for personal stuff. Cleaned up pics for the case,” followed by two laughing emojis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In text messages, Amiri counted the number of consecutive dog bite photos he collected, which, according to the suit, amounted to 28.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Juan Carlos Lara contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Two Antioch residents filed a civil rights lawsuit this week alleging city police officers intentionally injured them with a police dog and less-lethal launchers for amusement, bragged about their use of excessive force in text messages, and falsified records to conceal their misdeeds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The officers — Morteza Amiri, Eric Rombough and Devon Wenger — were among ten Antioch and Pittsburg police officers and employees \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11958522/fbi-arrests-antioch-pittsburg-police-officers-following-indictments\">indicted by the federal government\u003c/a> last year in a sprawling misconduct case that spiraled out of an FBI investigation uncovering thousands of racist text messages. Nearly half of the Antioch Police Department was temporarily \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\">placed on leave, the chief resigned, and the officers’ racial bias\u003c/a> tainted dozens of criminal cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Amiri, Rombough and Wenger’s use of force against plaintiffs Jessie Wilson and Dajon Smith was allegedly \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947876/antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years\">part of a years-long pattern\u003c/a> in which they planned and carried out excessive force against minorities, especially Black people, according to the federal lawsuit filed Wednesday in the Northern District of California. The officers allegedly referred to their targets as “gorillas,” among other derogatory language.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>While the incidents in question against Wilson and Smith took place in 2021, it’s only because of the unearthed text messages that they have the evidence they need to sue, their attorney Fulvio Cajina told KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The reason we’re bringing this lawsuit now is because we didn’t have the information to bring this lawsuit before,” Cajina said. “It’s only because of the FBI investigation into the Antioch Police Department that we know that there was a conspiracy amongst officers to target minorities and to intentionally violate their civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cajina said the text messages are “sickening.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch Police Department and city attorney did not respond to requests for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Much of the officers’ planning was carried out in text messages revealed by the FBI probe in which they frequently described the desire to beat people and allow Purcy, their K-9 unit, to bite them, according to the lawsuit. In February 2019, Rombough texted Amiri, “Yeah buddy we gonna f— some people up,” court documents showed. They discussed revenge for someone “f—ing with [an officer],” and Amiri texted Rombough, “blood for blood.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In January 2021, an officer texted Amiri to ask about his interaction with a suspect. Amiri responded, “lol putting a pistol in someone’s mouth and telling them to stop stealing isn’t illegal.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wilson was injured on Aug. 24, 2021, when Antioch police officers, including Amiri and Rombough, executed a search warrant to enter an Antioch residence, then entered Wilson’s locked room while he was sitting on an air mattress playing video games, according to the lawsuit. An unnamed officer pinned Wilson’s left arm down against his bed, and Rombough shot him with a 40mm less-lethal launcher, according to the indictment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A less-lethal launcher fires bean bags or sponge bullets and is intended to be used in crowd control environments, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.lesslethal.com/products/37mm-40mm/alstac-40-detail\">the website of Pacem Defense\u003c/a>, a company selling this type of launcher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rombough’s report about the incident differed from those written by other officers. An unnamed sergeant wrote to Rombough to critique his report, “you write that [Wilson] didn’t comply, but he clearly had his hands up at first. You need to describe way better what happened,” according to the suit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>When Antioch Police Department superiors became aware of the officers’ misdeeds, they helped them avoid discipline and accountability by concealing their actions in police reports, the suit alleges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith, a Black transgender woman, encountered the officers after she allegedly stole a Maserati on Oct. 26, 2021. The incident can be seen in officer-worn body camera footage \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/12/03/antioch-releases-video-of-officers-shooting-less-lethal-round-at-transgender-woman-whose-hands-were-raised/\">obtained by the Bay Area News Group\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police officers, including Wenger, surrounded Smith and the Maserati at an Antioch grocery store. Smith came out of the vehicle and faced the officers. Wenger can be heard saying to another officer, “You got the 40?” meaning the less-lethal launcher.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Smith stood by the vehicle with her hands up, and Wenger shot her in the chest with a 40mm less-lethal launcher. Antioch police officers are trained that the chest is a “potentially lethal” area to shoot someone with a 40mm less-lethal round, according to the suit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Smith begins to recoil in pain, the officers pin her to the ground and sic their police dog on her. The dog can be seen in the video tearing skin from her left arm.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Rombough collected photos of people he injured shooting the 40mm less-lethal launcher and told Antioch police officers he was collecting the launcher’s spent munitions to craft an American flag, using the munitions as stars and stripes, the suit alleges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Similarly, Amiri shared photos of victims bitten by their K9, Purcy. After one such bite in 2019, Amiri texted, “I’m gonna take more gory pics. gory [sic] pics are for personal stuff. Cleaned up pics for the case,” followed by two laughing emojis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In text messages, Amiri counted the number of consecutive dog bite photos he collected, which, according to the suit, amounted to 28.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED’s Juan Carlos Lara contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "Antioch Confronts History of Discrimination Against Chinese Immigrants",
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"content": "\u003cp>In 1939, after attending the Golden Gate International Exposition in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/hub/california\">San Francisco\u003c/a>, Alfred Chan and his friends were headed back home to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They got really hungry and decided to stop halfway in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/buddhist-ritual-karmic-healing-antiasian-hate-b77f2efa55ad8c9f955457157b46e3c8\">Antioch\u003c/a> for a meal,” his son Ron Chan said. But, the waitress refused to serve the young men or even talk to them. They left the establishment an hour later, hungry and humiliated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eighty-two years after that incident, Alfred Chan received an apology delivered in person by Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe in November 2022. Chan, a World War II veteran who served in the U.S. Navy and worked 38 years for the city of Oakland, died at age 98, about three months after hearing those words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Ron Chan \"]‘An apology may be just words that may not be enough to resolve all issues from the past. But without that first step, we have no progress.’[/pullquote]“It helped close a bad moment in my father’s life,” Ron Chan said, adding that it gave him peace to see his father’s closure as well. “An apology may be just words that may not be enough to resolve all issues from the past. But without that first step, we have no progress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In May 2021, Thorpe issued a formal apology for Antioch’s mistreatment of early Chinese immigrants, including the torching of Chinatown and driving out its residents, which local newspapers and historians have documented. Thorpe’s actions led to major cities like \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/immigration-lifestyle-california-discrimination-race-and-ethnicity-aee187a07daeb4ef3e53459347e6ae81\">San José\u003c/a>, Los Angeles and \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/immigration-california-san-francisco-san-jose-714e5757c478f48a5a39cc6910e4f467\">San Francisco\u003c/a> passing similar resolutions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 2021 apology has also led to residents and historians delving deeper into the past and working to establish a Chinatown Historic District, complete with murals and museum exhibits highlighting the history and accomplishments of the community in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11979962\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1440px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11979962\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white photo with a blazing city and people watching in the foreground.\" width=\"1440\" height=\"1065\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-800x592.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-1020x754.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-160x118.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo of San José’s Market Street Chinatown fire in 1887, believed to be arson. \u003ccite>(Courtesy History San Jose)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Chinese laborers were among the early population in Antioch, which was named in 1851. They likely numbered just under 100, said Lucy Meinhardt, an Antioch Historical Society Museum board member. They worked in farms, canneries and mines. They helped build river levees and established a Chinatown where the city’s downtown now stands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the 19th century, Chinese people across California endured discrimination such as wage disparity, bans on property ownership and sundown laws that barred them from going outside after dark. Those working and living around Antioch were no different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1871, a massive fire wiped out several blocks of Antioch’s Chinatown. The townspeople decided that a Chinese laundry needed to be torn down to stop the blaze. Then, in 1876, local newspapers reported that another blaze was deliberately started to drive six Chinese women who were allegedly prostitutes out of their homes. A Buddhist/Tao temple also perished in the fire, Meinhardt said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It became popular local lore that Antioch was a “sundown town,” and Chinese residents used tunnels to skirt the rules. Meinhardt said there is no record of such a law, “but it had to have been a practice if it existed. I still suspect it existed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before getting involved with the Antioch Historical Society and becoming committee chair for its Chinese History Project, Hans Ho said he had no idea a Chinatown once existed there. Chinese people were undoubtedly treated as second-class citizens, Ho said, who emigrated from Hong Kong in the 1960s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Regardless of which narrative you believe in, it is still an atrocity because these people were expelled or persecuted without due process of law, and their houses were burned down,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside label=\"Related Stories\" postID=\"news_11975584,news_11973503,news_11953107,news_11974445\"]He was also one of the representatives from the Chinese American community to receive Thorpe’s apology, an act that moved him to tears.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was shamelessly crying,” said Ho, who became visibly choked up just recalling that moment. “It’s the most obvious means of reconciliation that I’ve ever encountered.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, the city of more than 111,000 is 25% white, while Asians make up 12%. Hispanic and Black residents make up 35% and 20% of the population, respectively. Making progress on Asian American representation in public spaces remains an uphill struggle. Plans for a public memorial paying tribute to early Chinese settlers are at a standstill after a consultant recommended the city invest in more research.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even creating a space for some materials related to Chinese residents at the Antioch Historical Society Museum has gotten pushback.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“(One board member) said that they wanted this to be an ‘American’ museum,” said Dwayne Eubanks, a past president of the historical society, who is African American. “I took umbrage to that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He held up a picture of his father in his Army uniform and told the man: “This is an American.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Dwayne Eubanks, former president, Antioch Historical Society Museum\"]‘We do not want this to happen to our grandkids. We don’t want history to repeat itself.’[/pullquote]On Saturday, Eubanks, Meinhardt and Ho all attended the May We Gather event in Antioch, which organizers described as the first national memorial service and pilgrimage in response to anti-Asian violence. Attendees, including the three residents, walked meditatively with Buddhist monks, nuns and lay leaders around the city block where Antioch’s Chinatown stood 150 years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ho said such events, while educational, should guard against portraying communities of color as victims and instead spotlight stories of Asian American accomplishments in the face of stark adversity. Somewhat agreeing with his friend, Eubanks pointed out that “healing is a two-way street” and that those who hate must first understand and acknowledge what happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then they have the opportunity to accept the medicine because hate is a sickness,” he said. “We do not want this to happen to our grandkids. We don’t want history to repeat itself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In 1939, after attending the Golden Gate International Exposition in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/hub/california\">San Francisco\u003c/a>, Alfred Chan and his friends were headed back home to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They got really hungry and decided to stop halfway in \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/buddhist-ritual-karmic-healing-antiasian-hate-b77f2efa55ad8c9f955457157b46e3c8\">Antioch\u003c/a> for a meal,” his son Ron Chan said. But, the waitress refused to serve the young men or even talk to them. They left the establishment an hour later, hungry and humiliated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eighty-two years after that incident, Alfred Chan received an apology delivered in person by Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe in November 2022. Chan, a World War II veteran who served in the U.S. Navy and worked 38 years for the city of Oakland, died at age 98, about three months after hearing those words.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘An apology may be just words that may not be enough to resolve all issues from the past. But without that first step, we have no progress.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“It helped close a bad moment in my father’s life,” Ron Chan said, adding that it gave him peace to see his father’s closure as well. “An apology may be just words that may not be enough to resolve all issues from the past. But without that first step, we have no progress.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In May 2021, Thorpe issued a formal apology for Antioch’s mistreatment of early Chinese immigrants, including the torching of Chinatown and driving out its residents, which local newspapers and historians have documented. Thorpe’s actions led to major cities like \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/immigration-lifestyle-california-discrimination-race-and-ethnicity-aee187a07daeb4ef3e53459347e6ae81\">San José\u003c/a>, Los Angeles and \u003ca href=\"https://apnews.com/article/immigration-california-san-francisco-san-jose-714e5757c478f48a5a39cc6910e4f467\">San Francisco\u003c/a> passing similar resolutions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The 2021 apology has also led to residents and historians delving deeper into the past and working to establish a Chinatown Historic District, complete with murals and museum exhibits highlighting the history and accomplishments of the community in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11979962\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1440px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11979962\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut.jpg\" alt=\"A black and white photo with a blazing city and people watching in the foreground.\" width=\"1440\" height=\"1065\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut.jpg 1440w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-800x592.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-1020x754.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/19973001683_qut-160x118.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo of San José’s Market Street Chinatown fire in 1887, believed to be arson. \u003ccite>(Courtesy History San Jose)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Chinese laborers were among the early population in Antioch, which was named in 1851. They likely numbered just under 100, said Lucy Meinhardt, an Antioch Historical Society Museum board member. They worked in farms, canneries and mines. They helped build river levees and established a Chinatown where the city’s downtown now stands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the 19th century, Chinese people across California endured discrimination such as wage disparity, bans on property ownership and sundown laws that barred them from going outside after dark. Those working and living around Antioch were no different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 1871, a massive fire wiped out several blocks of Antioch’s Chinatown. The townspeople decided that a Chinese laundry needed to be torn down to stop the blaze. Then, in 1876, local newspapers reported that another blaze was deliberately started to drive six Chinese women who were allegedly prostitutes out of their homes. A Buddhist/Tao temple also perished in the fire, Meinhardt said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It became popular local lore that Antioch was a “sundown town,” and Chinese residents used tunnels to skirt the rules. Meinhardt said there is no record of such a law, “but it had to have been a practice if it existed. I still suspect it existed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Before getting involved with the Antioch Historical Society and becoming committee chair for its Chinese History Project, Hans Ho said he had no idea a Chinatown once existed there. Chinese people were undoubtedly treated as second-class citizens, Ho said, who emigrated from Hong Kong in the 1960s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Regardless of which narrative you believe in, it is still an atrocity because these people were expelled or persecuted without due process of law, and their houses were burned down,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>He was also one of the representatives from the Chinese American community to receive Thorpe’s apology, an act that moved him to tears.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was shamelessly crying,” said Ho, who became visibly choked up just recalling that moment. “It’s the most obvious means of reconciliation that I’ve ever encountered.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, the city of more than 111,000 is 25% white, while Asians make up 12%. Hispanic and Black residents make up 35% and 20% of the population, respectively. Making progress on Asian American representation in public spaces remains an uphill struggle. Plans for a public memorial paying tribute to early Chinese settlers are at a standstill after a consultant recommended the city invest in more research.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Even creating a space for some materials related to Chinese residents at the Antioch Historical Society Museum has gotten pushback.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“(One board member) said that they wanted this to be an ‘American’ museum,” said Dwayne Eubanks, a past president of the historical society, who is African American. “I took umbrage to that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He held up a picture of his father in his Army uniform and told the man: “This is an American.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘We do not want this to happen to our grandkids. We don’t want history to repeat itself.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>On Saturday, Eubanks, Meinhardt and Ho all attended the May We Gather event in Antioch, which organizers described as the first national memorial service and pilgrimage in response to anti-Asian violence. Attendees, including the three residents, walked meditatively with Buddhist monks, nuns and lay leaders around the city block where Antioch’s Chinatown stood 150 years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ho said such events, while educational, should guard against portraying communities of color as victims and instead spotlight stories of Asian American accomplishments in the face of stark adversity. Somewhat agreeing with his friend, Eubanks pointed out that “healing is a two-way street” and that those who hate must first understand and acknowledge what happened.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“And then they have the opportunity to accept the medicine because hate is a sickness,” he said. “We do not want this to happen to our grandkids. We don’t want history to repeat itself.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "How the Racial Justice Act Could Shake Up California's Criminal Court System",
"headTitle": "How the Racial Justice Act Could Shake Up California’s Criminal Court System | KQED",
"content": "\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Race has been a mostly silent character in criminal courtrooms. Historically, people accused of crimes haven’t been able to raise claims of racial bias in the justice system to defend themselves from a criminal accusation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">But in 2020, California passed the Racial Justice Act, a groundbreaking law that allows criminal defendants to argue that racism may have played a role in how the justice system handled their case and ask for the court to provide a remedy. It’s the first law of its kind in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">KQED’s Annelise Finney explains how one case in Contra Costa County is testing the limits of the new law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC3440899700&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003cstrong>Links:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11975584/californias-groundbreaking-racial-justice-act-cuts-its-teeth-in-contra-costa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">California’s Groundbreaking Racial Justice Act Cuts Its Teeth in Contra Costa\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Judge Finds 8 Antioch Police Officers Tainted by Racial Bias, Reduces Criminal Charges\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>The following episode contains explicit language. I’m Alan Montecillo in for Ericka Cruz Guevarra. And welcome to the Bay local news to keep you rooted. Race is central to our conversations about criminal justice in America. But once you actually enter the criminal courtroom, race is a mostly silent character. That’s because people accused of crimes haven’t been able to raise claims of racial bias in the justice system to defend themselves. But that has changed thanks to a new, groundbreaking state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>This is groundbreaking and historic. The type of information that we’ve been able to present through our expert witnesses is not something that has been traditionally allowed to be brought into criminal courts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>This law is called the Racial Justice Act, the first of its kind in the nation. And now we’re seeing it affect real people’s lives, including in one high profile case in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>It feels like for the first time, the court system is talking in a real, open and honest way about its racist legacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Today, I spoke with KQED’s annelise Finney about the Racial Justice Act and how it changed the course of one trial in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>The Racial Justice Act is a 2020 California law that essentially prohibits the government from seeking a conviction on the basis of race, ethnicity, or national origin. What it did that’s pretty groundbreaking is it created a way for people who are accused of crimes to challenge the charges against them in court. So in the process of their trial and as the case moves towards trial, they can ask the judge to throw out portions of the charges against them. If they can prove that racism was involved in either their arrest or their way, they were charged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>How radical of a change is that from the way the criminal court system has normally functioned?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>That’s a huge change. I mean, public defenders and people of color, black people in particular, have been calling out racism in the justice system for decades. In the US, court cases have often been this very high profile case in which racism in America is on display. Like, for example, if you think about the Central Park Five case, if you think about the OJ Simpson case. Race was a huge part of these cases, but it wasn’t really an actor that had the ability to speak. There was no way to raise racism in criminal court cases. So it didn’t really get raised and people were convicted and sent to prison, even when racism may have played a part in how they ended up on trial in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>How many people could this law affect?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>This could affect tens of thousands of people. One estimate is that three quarters of people who are currently in California state prisons could have viable Racial Justice Act claims, and that’s about 90,000 people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So the Racial Justice Act passed in 2020. Why are we talking about this law now?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So when this law was approved, there was still a fair amount to be figured out. And a lot of that figuring out is going to happen later as the law is put into practice and the court responds to it in different ways. Over the last year, we’ve begun to see a lot of these test cases, and one in particular in Antioch, caught my attention and has made some big changes in understanding how this law is going to work in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, let’s dive into this murder case in Contra Costa County. Where does this story begin?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>On March 9th in 2021, the police allege that four men shot a car 40 times in a drive by shooting on a residential street in Antioch. One young man, Arnold Marcel Hawkins, who was 22 at the time, was killed and another man was seriously injured. Less than a month later, the police arrested four young men from all over Northern California, all of whom were black, and the police say that the shooting was the product of a feud between two East Bay gangs. The four young men who were arrested include Eric Windham, Terry on Pugh, Trent Allen, and Keyshawn McGee. Their arrest was the product of a coalition of a lot of East Bay law enforcement working together, and when they make this arrest, they say, essentially this is a big win for cutting down on gun violence and particularly gang fueled gun violence in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>And what were these four men initially charged with?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>The top charges are murder and attempted murder, and both of those carry a series of enhancements. Enhancements are a type of additional charge that can be added on top of a criminal charge. And essentially what they do is just lengthen the possible sentence somebody might get if they’re convicted at trial. Enhancements on a murder charge can lead to the death penalty. But in Contra Costa County, the D.A. has said they’re not going to charge the death penalty. So the top sentence that could have resulted from that would have been life in prison without parole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So how does the Racial Justice Act, this new law in California, come in in this murder case?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>One of the defense attorneys on this case is somebody who works for Contra Costa as alternate public defender, an attorney named Evan Kuluk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>I’ve been a public defender for a little over 15 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney; \u003c/strong>And he said that he has seen tons of young men, both black and Latino, being charged with gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>Especially from Richmond and especially from Antioch, being charged with gang allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So he decided he wanted to look into this and use this new California law. He asked the Contra Costa District attorney to provide data to him on their charging practices, specifically about gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>And what does this data show?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, the records he got were from 2015 to 2022. He found that black men accused of gang related murders were 44% more likely to be charged with special circumstance gang enhancements than defendants of other races who were accused of similar gang related murders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what does that mean then? What happens with this data and how does it change the case against these four men?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So using this data, Evan goes to the court and he requests a racial justice hearing. He calls in a UC Irvine statistician to talk about what this data means and explain how they came to these numbers. And ultimately the judge sits in decision for a while and decides to dismiss the gang enhancements. Interestingly, in this case, it doesn’t make that much of a difference in terms of their sentencing risk or what they could be sentenced to. But it is an important win, and it sets a precedent for the state around gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So lawyers are successful at using data to get these gang enhancements dropped using the Racial Justice Act. But we also know that’s not the only time that this issue of racial bias comes up in in this murder case in Antioch. And I know it relates to a pretty egregious and I think, well known scandal at the Antioch Police Department. Tell us about that scandal and how it relates to this case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>In the spring of last year, an FBI probe into behavior by Antioch and Pittsburgh police officers came across hundreds of text messages sent between members of both departments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Those texts, were racist, and use homophobic language to talk about people that they’re investigating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Finding between 2019 and 2022, officers texted messages like, “We just ean down a monkey.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Messages like this one, where an officer wrote, “I’ll bury that n in my fields. And yes, it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And when these texts become public, there’s a massive uproar in both of those cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Tempers and emotions certainly boiled over during public comment. And what I saw inside really was a city reckoning with what residents have said are years of discriminatory treatment by police. But even Mayor Lamar Thorpe said, has persisted in Antioch for far too long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And I know one reason why these texts became such a big deal, besides the fact that the language used in them is horrific and offensive, is that they’re often discussing criminal cases, including this one. Right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>That’s right. So two investigating officers in this case, Eric Rambert and Jonathan Adams, spoke explicitly about the defendants. This was while they were on assignment, surveilling the four suspects at the time at a barbecue place in Concord. And they have an exchange over a period of 22 minutes. And then they really specifically joked about violence towards the suspects. In one example, one officer writes about kicking Trent Allen, one of the young men, in the head, and kicking his head like a football. In another example, they take photos of two of the young men who are injured in their hospital beds in various states of undress and send that to other officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So how did people react when these texts became public, especially the loved ones of the four defendants?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>When this information becomes public, the Antioch Police Department puts about half of the department on leave. And as I said before, people were furious, and in particular the family members of the four young men on trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>I just don’t understand why these officers is not taking no accountability for what they did.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>At one court hearing, Sheryll Cobbs, the mother of Trent Allen, was particularly upset that the officers were somehow evading the subpoenas that had been served to them to come to court to testify about the text messages that they sent. I.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Schirelle Cobbs: \u003c/strong>Don’t understand that. It’s hard. Hard for me to sleep at night. And I see officers. Afraid. Not knowing if these officers got high powered is nothing going on, isn’t it’s taking so long for something for these officers to get arrested for doing a crime that they did.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what do lawyers for these four young men do with this information, with these explicitly racist texts that are now in the public?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So they turn around and fresh off their last racial justice hearing when they ask for a second racial justice hearing, this time saying that the police officers who investigated this case were tainted by racial bias. And the proof of that is these racist text messages. What the defense attorneys asked for in this second hearing is for the judge to throw out essentially any charge, any enhancement that might lead to a life without parole sentence. And that’s something that they think is important, because here they believe the entire police department is compromised by racial bias.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>The sheer number of officers on these texts showed that they were supporting each other, that they weren’t afraid, to use that language amongst a large…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And this is something that defense attorney Evan Kuluk spoke about at a press conference outside the courtroom one afternoon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>The tropes, the language harkened back to a horrific, history of racism, slavery, lynchings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what does the judge decide to do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So ultimately, Judge David Goldstein hears the arguments from the defense. He hears from a series of experts who talk about racial bias. He says with this for a number of months, and ultimately decides to strike all enhancements that could lead to a life without parole sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>That sounds like a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>It is a lot. I mean, it takes what would otherwise be a life sentence and returns it to something that means that these young men could one day get out of prison if they’re ultimately convicted at trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Annelise. Why do you think this case in Contra Costa County is one of the first examples of the Racial Justice Act being successfully used? Like why here and why now? Do you think.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>This is something I talked to the district attorney’s office about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>I think there are a number of sort of converging points that have come together to make this the most relevant legal issue in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And one person I spoke to, Simon O’Connell, who’s a chief assistant D.A., said that he thought it was sort of the perfect storm in a Contra Costa County. The DA was willing to provide data to the defense in that first Racial Justice Act claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>I think that stems from a desire, to be transparent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Which is pretty different than what a lot of counties do, where DA’s have been incredibly resistant to requests for data by public defenders. And then on top of that, they had this massive scandal. This is one of the biggest police scandals to hit the Bay area since the riders case in Oakland in the early 2000. So those things together set up this case for a really impactful series of Racial Justice Act claims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>There’s no greater crime than murder. And at the same time, we have expressed racial animus, and that’s why it’s getting so much attention as well. The state is watching.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Coming up, how the Racial Justice Act could make bigger waves across California. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>What would it take then, for this law to have a bigger impact in California beyond this one case in Antioch?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>As I mentioned before, this new law is really just kind of getting up and running. We’re still figuring out how courts are going to respond to it, and public defenders are still learning how to bring these types of cases. One thing they need in order to be successful is a lot of financial support. Getting experts to consult with you, getting them to come to a hearing that can cost a lot of money that public defenders often don’t have. On top of that, a lot of people who are in prison who might be eligible to bring these types of claims, they need lawyers to begin with, and there aren’t enough public defenders available to provide that appellate defense. That’s something that California doesn’t guarantee to people who are in prison. The access to a free attorney. If you want to bring a challenge to a conviction that’s already been established. There’s also data, this type of statistical claim where you’re pointing out implicit bias. You have to have a lot of data for that. And a lot of places just don’t even collect data. Counties have never been required in California to collect data on the race of the people they charge or the people they convict. And that’s something that the state of California is trying to change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So if you’re someone who wants to reform the criminal justice system, reduce or even get rid of mass incarceration, you need a lot of things to go right essentially for this law. But are there ways this could go sideways? Like, what are the ways that the Racial Justice Act could be unsuccessful?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Well, I mean, if those two things aren’t provided, if data and funding are not provided, it’s going to be pretty hard for this to really get any traction and be the sort of engine for de cursory action that I think it’s proponents hope that it will be. Another thing that could go sideways here is that ultimately, we don’t have another system of accountability right now. We just have the justice system, our courts that we’re all familiar with, and that this law is trying to make better and make more just for the residents of this state. But when we are able to poke holes in it and say, you know, the police are proving to have been racist, the charging practices are proving to have been racist. Where does that leave us? How do we rebuild it and tear it down at the same time?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, and where does it leave victims and their families? Right. That’s the one thing we haven’t talked about yet. You know, what impact could this have on people who are hoping for the justice system, such as it is to provide some kind of closure? And then it’s discovered that the whole process might have been tainted by racial bias. Where does it leave them?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Well, it leads them in a really hard spot. I spoke for a while with the mother of Arnold Marcell Hawkins, Brandi Griffin, and for her, watching these hearings was excruciating. She was just seeing what felt to her like justice slipping out of her hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Brandi Griffin: \u003c/strong>I don’t give a shit about the racist Texas. We all talk racist shit. The principal knew he was murdered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>She was very upset and spoke about this at a press conference one afternoon outside of the courthouse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Brandi Griffin; \u003c/strong>He is dead, Marcell. They killed him. This is about the murder of my son. Say his name. I know Marcell Hawkins. His name. Come on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>One thing that is hardest with hearing what Brandi has to say is that her perception in that moment is that maybe this would have played out differently if her son wasn’t black, that maybe. Also, there’s this double edged sword where racism is perhaps being perpetrated against both the people who are accused in this crime and the people who are the victims of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what questions does Brandi Griffins predicament and this bigger case in Antioch bring up for you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>You know, this is something that Simon O’Connell, the chief assistant to the DEA, brought up, which is this balance that the justice system right now is trying to strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>So this is something that is a real reckoning for how we just view criminal justice and the meaning of justice and outcomes for all people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>How do we untangle this long history of racism in our justice system, a history that is in many ways shaped the way our justice system works, while also providing accountability, doing what the justice system set out to do for people like Brandi Griffin, who have lost loved ones. I think part of what’s challenging here is that in California, the people who are most likely to be the victims of crime are also people of color, particularly low income people. And we need to have something we can offer them that actually works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, Annelise. Thank you so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>That was KQED reporter Annalise Finney. This conversation was cut down by Ellie Prickett Morgan and edited by me. Maria a skincare scored this episode and edited all the tape. Additional production support from Ericka Cruz Guevara. Music courtesy of Audio Network and First Car Music. The Bay is a production of KQED Public Radio in San Francisco. Jen Chan is our director of podcasts. Katie Springer is our podcast operations manager. Cesar Saldana is our podcast engagement producer. Marcus Stannard is our podcast engagement intern. And KQED chief content officer is Holly Kernan. I’m Alan Marsilio in for Ericka Cruz Guevara. Thanks for listening. Talk to you Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\n\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003ca href=\"#episode-transcript\">\u003ci>View the full episode transcript.\u003c/i>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">Race has been a mostly silent character in criminal courtrooms. Historically, people accused of crimes haven’t been able to raise claims of racial bias in the justice system to defend themselves from a criminal accusation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">But in 2020, California passed the Racial Justice Act, a groundbreaking law that allows criminal defendants to argue that racism may have played a role in how the justice system handled their case and ask for the court to provide a remedy. It’s the first law of its kind in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">KQED’s Annelise Finney explains how one case in Contra Costa County is testing the limits of the new law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC3440899700&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\">\u003cstrong>Links:\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11975584/californias-groundbreaking-racial-justice-act-cuts-its-teeth-in-contra-costa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">California’s Groundbreaking Racial Justice Act Cuts Its Teeth in Contra Costa\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003cli dir=\"ltr\">\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\" role=\"presentation\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Judge Finds 8 Antioch Police Officers Tainted by Racial Bias, Reduces Criminal Charges\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-content post-body\">\u003ch2 id=\"episode-transcript\">Episode Transcript\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp class=\"p1\">\u003ci>This is a computer-generated transcript. While our team has reviewed it, there may be errors.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>The following episode contains explicit language. I’m Alan Montecillo in for Ericka Cruz Guevarra. And welcome to the Bay local news to keep you rooted. Race is central to our conversations about criminal justice in America. But once you actually enter the criminal courtroom, race is a mostly silent character. That’s because people accused of crimes haven’t been able to raise claims of racial bias in the justice system to defend themselves. But that has changed thanks to a new, groundbreaking state law.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>This is groundbreaking and historic. The type of information that we’ve been able to present through our expert witnesses is not something that has been traditionally allowed to be brought into criminal courts.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>This law is called the Racial Justice Act, the first of its kind in the nation. And now we’re seeing it affect real people’s lives, including in one high profile case in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>It feels like for the first time, the court system is talking in a real, open and honest way about its racist legacy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Today, I spoke with KQED’s annelise Finney about the Racial Justice Act and how it changed the course of one trial in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>The Racial Justice Act is a 2020 California law that essentially prohibits the government from seeking a conviction on the basis of race, ethnicity, or national origin. What it did that’s pretty groundbreaking is it created a way for people who are accused of crimes to challenge the charges against them in court. So in the process of their trial and as the case moves towards trial, they can ask the judge to throw out portions of the charges against them. If they can prove that racism was involved in either their arrest or their way, they were charged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>How radical of a change is that from the way the criminal court system has normally functioned?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>That’s a huge change. I mean, public defenders and people of color, black people in particular, have been calling out racism in the justice system for decades. In the US, court cases have often been this very high profile case in which racism in America is on display. Like, for example, if you think about the Central Park Five case, if you think about the OJ Simpson case. Race was a huge part of these cases, but it wasn’t really an actor that had the ability to speak. There was no way to raise racism in criminal court cases. So it didn’t really get raised and people were convicted and sent to prison, even when racism may have played a part in how they ended up on trial in the first place.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>How many people could this law affect?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>This could affect tens of thousands of people. One estimate is that three quarters of people who are currently in California state prisons could have viable Racial Justice Act claims, and that’s about 90,000 people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So the Racial Justice Act passed in 2020. Why are we talking about this law now?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So when this law was approved, there was still a fair amount to be figured out. And a lot of that figuring out is going to happen later as the law is put into practice and the court responds to it in different ways. Over the last year, we’ve begun to see a lot of these test cases, and one in particular in Antioch, caught my attention and has made some big changes in understanding how this law is going to work in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, let’s dive into this murder case in Contra Costa County. Where does this story begin?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>On March 9th in 2021, the police allege that four men shot a car 40 times in a drive by shooting on a residential street in Antioch. One young man, Arnold Marcel Hawkins, who was 22 at the time, was killed and another man was seriously injured. Less than a month later, the police arrested four young men from all over Northern California, all of whom were black, and the police say that the shooting was the product of a feud between two East Bay gangs. The four young men who were arrested include Eric Windham, Terry on Pugh, Trent Allen, and Keyshawn McGee. Their arrest was the product of a coalition of a lot of East Bay law enforcement working together, and when they make this arrest, they say, essentially this is a big win for cutting down on gun violence and particularly gang fueled gun violence in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>And what were these four men initially charged with?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>The top charges are murder and attempted murder, and both of those carry a series of enhancements. Enhancements are a type of additional charge that can be added on top of a criminal charge. And essentially what they do is just lengthen the possible sentence somebody might get if they’re convicted at trial. Enhancements on a murder charge can lead to the death penalty. But in Contra Costa County, the D.A. has said they’re not going to charge the death penalty. So the top sentence that could have resulted from that would have been life in prison without parole.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So how does the Racial Justice Act, this new law in California, come in in this murder case?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>One of the defense attorneys on this case is somebody who works for Contra Costa as alternate public defender, an attorney named Evan Kuluk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>I’ve been a public defender for a little over 15 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney; \u003c/strong>And he said that he has seen tons of young men, both black and Latino, being charged with gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>Especially from Richmond and especially from Antioch, being charged with gang allegations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So he decided he wanted to look into this and use this new California law. He asked the Contra Costa District attorney to provide data to him on their charging practices, specifically about gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>And what does this data show?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, the records he got were from 2015 to 2022. He found that black men accused of gang related murders were 44% more likely to be charged with special circumstance gang enhancements than defendants of other races who were accused of similar gang related murders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what does that mean then? What happens with this data and how does it change the case against these four men?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So using this data, Evan goes to the court and he requests a racial justice hearing. He calls in a UC Irvine statistician to talk about what this data means and explain how they came to these numbers. And ultimately the judge sits in decision for a while and decides to dismiss the gang enhancements. Interestingly, in this case, it doesn’t make that much of a difference in terms of their sentencing risk or what they could be sentenced to. But it is an important win, and it sets a precedent for the state around gang enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So lawyers are successful at using data to get these gang enhancements dropped using the Racial Justice Act. But we also know that’s not the only time that this issue of racial bias comes up in in this murder case in Antioch. And I know it relates to a pretty egregious and I think, well known scandal at the Antioch Police Department. Tell us about that scandal and how it relates to this case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>In the spring of last year, an FBI probe into behavior by Antioch and Pittsburgh police officers came across hundreds of text messages sent between members of both departments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Those texts, were racist, and use homophobic language to talk about people that they’re investigating.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Finding between 2019 and 2022, officers texted messages like, “We just ean down a monkey.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Messages like this one, where an officer wrote, “I’ll bury that n in my fields. And yes, it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And when these texts become public, there’s a massive uproar in both of those cities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>Tempers and emotions certainly boiled over during public comment. And what I saw inside really was a city reckoning with what residents have said are years of discriminatory treatment by police. But even Mayor Lamar Thorpe said, has persisted in Antioch for far too long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And I know one reason why these texts became such a big deal, besides the fact that the language used in them is horrific and offensive, is that they’re often discussing criminal cases, including this one. Right?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>That’s right. So two investigating officers in this case, Eric Rambert and Jonathan Adams, spoke explicitly about the defendants. This was while they were on assignment, surveilling the four suspects at the time at a barbecue place in Concord. And they have an exchange over a period of 22 minutes. And then they really specifically joked about violence towards the suspects. In one example, one officer writes about kicking Trent Allen, one of the young men, in the head, and kicking his head like a football. In another example, they take photos of two of the young men who are injured in their hospital beds in various states of undress and send that to other officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So how did people react when these texts became public, especially the loved ones of the four defendants?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>When this information becomes public, the Antioch Police Department puts about half of the department on leave. And as I said before, people were furious, and in particular the family members of the four young men on trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>News Anchor: \u003c/strong>I just don’t understand why these officers is not taking no accountability for what they did.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>At one court hearing, Sheryll Cobbs, the mother of Trent Allen, was particularly upset that the officers were somehow evading the subpoenas that had been served to them to come to court to testify about the text messages that they sent. I.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Schirelle Cobbs: \u003c/strong>Don’t understand that. It’s hard. Hard for me to sleep at night. And I see officers. Afraid. Not knowing if these officers got high powered is nothing going on, isn’t it’s taking so long for something for these officers to get arrested for doing a crime that they did.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what do lawyers for these four young men do with this information, with these explicitly racist texts that are now in the public?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Yeah. So they turn around and fresh off their last racial justice hearing when they ask for a second racial justice hearing, this time saying that the police officers who investigated this case were tainted by racial bias. And the proof of that is these racist text messages. What the defense attorneys asked for in this second hearing is for the judge to throw out essentially any charge, any enhancement that might lead to a life without parole sentence. And that’s something that they think is important, because here they believe the entire police department is compromised by racial bias.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>The sheer number of officers on these texts showed that they were supporting each other, that they weren’t afraid, to use that language amongst a large…\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And this is something that defense attorney Evan Kuluk spoke about at a press conference outside the courtroom one afternoon.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evan Kuluk: \u003c/strong>The tropes, the language harkened back to a horrific, history of racism, slavery, lynchings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what does the judge decide to do?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>So ultimately, Judge David Goldstein hears the arguments from the defense. He hears from a series of experts who talk about racial bias. He says with this for a number of months, and ultimately decides to strike all enhancements that could lead to a life without parole sentence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>That sounds like a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>It is a lot. I mean, it takes what would otherwise be a life sentence and returns it to something that means that these young men could one day get out of prison if they’re ultimately convicted at trial.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Annelise. Why do you think this case in Contra Costa County is one of the first examples of the Racial Justice Act being successfully used? Like why here and why now? Do you think.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>This is something I talked to the district attorney’s office about?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>I think there are a number of sort of converging points that have come together to make this the most relevant legal issue in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>And one person I spoke to, Simon O’Connell, who’s a chief assistant D.A., said that he thought it was sort of the perfect storm in a Contra Costa County. The DA was willing to provide data to the defense in that first Racial Justice Act claim.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>I think that stems from a desire, to be transparent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Which is pretty different than what a lot of counties do, where DA’s have been incredibly resistant to requests for data by public defenders. And then on top of that, they had this massive scandal. This is one of the biggest police scandals to hit the Bay area since the riders case in Oakland in the early 2000. So those things together set up this case for a really impactful series of Racial Justice Act claims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>There’s no greater crime than murder. And at the same time, we have expressed racial animus, and that’s why it’s getting so much attention as well. The state is watching.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Coming up, how the Racial Justice Act could make bigger waves across California. Stay with us.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>What would it take then, for this law to have a bigger impact in California beyond this one case in Antioch?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>As I mentioned before, this new law is really just kind of getting up and running. We’re still figuring out how courts are going to respond to it, and public defenders are still learning how to bring these types of cases. One thing they need in order to be successful is a lot of financial support. Getting experts to consult with you, getting them to come to a hearing that can cost a lot of money that public defenders often don’t have. On top of that, a lot of people who are in prison who might be eligible to bring these types of claims, they need lawyers to begin with, and there aren’t enough public defenders available to provide that appellate defense. That’s something that California doesn’t guarantee to people who are in prison. The access to a free attorney. If you want to bring a challenge to a conviction that’s already been established. There’s also data, this type of statistical claim where you’re pointing out implicit bias. You have to have a lot of data for that. And a lot of places just don’t even collect data. Counties have never been required in California to collect data on the race of the people they charge or the people they convict. And that’s something that the state of California is trying to change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So if you’re someone who wants to reform the criminal justice system, reduce or even get rid of mass incarceration, you need a lot of things to go right essentially for this law. But are there ways this could go sideways? Like, what are the ways that the Racial Justice Act could be unsuccessful?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Well, I mean, if those two things aren’t provided, if data and funding are not provided, it’s going to be pretty hard for this to really get any traction and be the sort of engine for de cursory action that I think it’s proponents hope that it will be. Another thing that could go sideways here is that ultimately, we don’t have another system of accountability right now. We just have the justice system, our courts that we’re all familiar with, and that this law is trying to make better and make more just for the residents of this state. But when we are able to poke holes in it and say, you know, the police are proving to have been racist, the charging practices are proving to have been racist. Where does that leave us? How do we rebuild it and tear it down at the same time?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, and where does it leave victims and their families? Right. That’s the one thing we haven’t talked about yet. You know, what impact could this have on people who are hoping for the justice system, such as it is to provide some kind of closure? And then it’s discovered that the whole process might have been tainted by racial bias. Where does it leave them?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Well, it leads them in a really hard spot. I spoke for a while with the mother of Arnold Marcell Hawkins, Brandi Griffin, and for her, watching these hearings was excruciating. She was just seeing what felt to her like justice slipping out of her hands.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Brandi Griffin: \u003c/strong>I don’t give a shit about the racist Texas. We all talk racist shit. The principal knew he was murdered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>She was very upset and spoke about this at a press conference one afternoon outside of the courthouse.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Brandi Griffin; \u003c/strong>He is dead, Marcell. They killed him. This is about the murder of my son. Say his name. I know Marcell Hawkins. His name. Come on.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>One thing that is hardest with hearing what Brandi has to say is that her perception in that moment is that maybe this would have played out differently if her son wasn’t black, that maybe. Also, there’s this double edged sword where racism is perhaps being perpetrated against both the people who are accused in this crime and the people who are the victims of it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>So what questions does Brandi Griffins predicament and this bigger case in Antioch bring up for you?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>You know, this is something that Simon O’Connell, the chief assistant to the DEA, brought up, which is this balance that the justice system right now is trying to strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Simon O’Connell: \u003c/strong>So this is something that is a real reckoning for how we just view criminal justice and the meaning of justice and outcomes for all people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>How do we untangle this long history of racism in our justice system, a history that is in many ways shaped the way our justice system works, while also providing accountability, doing what the justice system set out to do for people like Brandi Griffin, who have lost loved ones. I think part of what’s challenging here is that in California, the people who are most likely to be the victims of crime are also people of color, particularly low income people. And we need to have something we can offer them that actually works.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>Well, Annelise. Thank you so much.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Annelise Finney: \u003c/strong>Thanks for having me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Alan Montecillo: \u003c/strong>That was KQED reporter Annalise Finney. This conversation was cut down by Ellie Prickett Morgan and edited by me. Maria a skincare scored this episode and edited all the tape. Additional production support from Ericka Cruz Guevara. Music courtesy of Audio Network and First Car Music. The Bay is a production of KQED Public Radio in San Francisco. Jen Chan is our director of podcasts. Katie Springer is our podcast operations manager. Cesar Saldana is our podcast engagement producer. Marcus Stannard is our podcast engagement intern. And KQED chief content officer is Holly Kernan. I’m Alan Marsilio in for Ericka Cruz Guevara. Thanks for listening. Talk to you Monday.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"font-weight: 400\">\n\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>"
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"title": "California's Groundbreaking Racial Justice Act Cuts Its Teeth in Contra Costa",
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"content": "\u003cp>The effort to change the fundamental way race is considered in the California justice system received a jolt last week when a Contra Costa Superior Court judge \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\">ruled that racism within the Antioch Police Department tainted a murder investigation\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Feb. 5, Judge David Goldstein, a former public defender, removed all gang enhancements that could have resulted in life without parole sentences for the four men charged with the murder. Defense attorneys used the California Racial Justice Act to argue that racism tainted the handling of the case, from the murder investigation to the charges given to the four defendants, all of whom are Black and in their early 20s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Vienna Peterson Joiner, Eric Windom's mother \"]‘People think that just because slavery ended, racism was pulled out at the root. But it wasn’t.’[/pullquote]It was the second time Goldstein ruled that anti-Black bias had shaped elements of the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Race has been a mostly silent character in criminal courtrooms because race couldn’t be raised explicitly in court proceedings to defend someone accused of a crime until the RJA. The law, enacted in 2020, is the first of its kind in the country. Over several months, a KQED reporter attended the RJA hearings in the case. KQED also spoke with defense attorneys, prosecutors and community members about how the law is changing the way race is recognized in courtrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of July, four young men in yellow jumpsuits were spread across the courtroom as the afternoon sun streamed through windows behind Goldstein’s bench. Keyshawn McGee and Trent Allen sat in the jury box. Eric Windom and Terryonn Pugh were tucked in around the far end of the attorney’s table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Behind them, the gallery was packed. The hallway outside the courtroom was filled with an overflow of family members, reporters and curious attorneys taking advantage of breaks between court appearances to get a glimpse of the historic hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The four men were charged with an alleged gang-related murder and attempted murder. The murder charge included five enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what happened: On March 9, 2021, police allege that the four men shot a car 40 times in a drive-by shooting on a residential street in Antioch. Arnold Marcel Hawkins, 22, was killed and another man was wounded. The shooting was allegedly part of a long-running feud between two East Bay gangs. The arrests of the men \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80Gb7Z1vaLM\">were heralded by East Bay law enforcement\u003c/a> as a meaningful step toward reducing gun violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Updated last year, the RJA made two major changes to existing state law. First, it created a way for defense attorneys to raise racism in court to defend someone accused of a crime. Second, it broadened what kind of evidence the court can consider to include indications of implicit bias, usually an analysis of the outcomes of similar cases that reveal the preferential or discriminatory treatment of one demographic group or another.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Contra Costa County, a growing number of RJA claims have recently gained traction. The ruling in the case against McGee, Allen, Pugh and Windom was the third time a Contra Costa judge has sided with the RJA, which allows judges to exclude witness testimony and drop charges, among other options.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It will hopefully be a model for defendants across the state,” said Evan Kuluk, Windom’s attorney. “If the police who investigated their case were racially biased, used excessive force or spoke about them in racially discriminatory ways, there truly is a remedy available.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Reparations Task Force submitted a \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/ab3121/report\">1,000-page report\u003c/a> to the state Legislature last summer, which included provisions to strengthen the RJA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The heart of implicit bias is when racism becomes so endemic, so pervasive, so enduring, so intractable, that it’s normal course,” Donald Tamaki, an attorney and task force member, told KQED. “So how do you disrupt that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974445/california-reparations-backers-applaud-bills-even-without-big-cash-payouts\">members of California’s legislative Black Caucus introduced a package of bills\u003c/a>, including four proposed changes to the state’s justice system. The proposed legislation does not include cash payments, but Tamaki and fellow task member Lisa Holder said policies like the RJA are just as important to reducing racial disparities as cutting a check.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11971366\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11971366\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"A person in a dark suit stands in front of a large outdoor flight of brick stairs.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Evan Kuluk, a public defender who used the California Racial Justice Act to argue that racism in the Antioch Police Department tainted a murder investigation, in front of the Wakefield Taylor Courthouse in Martinez on Aug. 25, 2023. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The district attorney\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Last spring, Kuluk was focused on how Contra Contra County district attorneys choose to add gang enhancements to murder charges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve handled a lot of cases with gang allegations in this county and saw what I believe to be a disproportionate number of Black young men, especially from Richmond and Antioch, being charged with gang allegations,” said Kuluk, a public defender for 15 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"left\" citation=\"Evan Kuluk, attorney\"]‘If the police who investigated their case were racially biased, used excessive force or spoke about them in racially discriminatory ways, there truly is a remedy available.’[/pullquote]As a member of the county’s Alternate Defender Office, Kuluk was assigned to represent Windom, now 24, who was pursuing a music career at the time of his arrest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kuluk and Windom requested charging records from Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton. With the help of a UC Irvine statistician, they found that from 2015–2022, Black men accused of gang-related murders were 44% more likely to be charged with enhancements than defendants of other races accused of similar gang-related murders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because they carry mandatory LWOP, the filing of special circumstances is an assertion that an individual is irredeemable,” Kuluk told KQED, referring to a life without the possibility of parole sentence. “It is beyond unfair and unacceptable for the government to more frequently deem Black people unworthy to ever get the opportunity to prove their redemption to a parole board.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton’s office disputed Kuluk’s findings, but in May, Windom and his co-defendants convinced the court that the district attorney had applied the enhancement in a biased way. The gang enhancement was dismissed. It was the first time in the United States, a country where Black residents are \u003ca href=\"https://www.sentencingproject.org/reports/the-color-of-justice-racial-and-ethnic-disparity-in-state-prisons-the-sentencing-project/\">five times more likely to be incarcerated in state prison than white residents\u003c/a>, that an argument of implicit bias in the justice system resulted in a charge being dropped from a criminal case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa Chief Assistant District Attorney Simon O’Connell said he doubted anyone in the office was knowingly targeting Black defendants for harsher punishment. But he said the RJA challenge gave the DA a reason to look more closely at their charging data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t know what we don’t know,” he said. “It was important for us to start looking at historical data to see if, in fact, there were implicit biases and trends in our data, which would be surprising to us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The police\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Windom and his three co-defendants had a second RJA hearing related to racist text messages uncovered by an FBI probe into alleged criminal activity by the Antioch and Pittsburg police departments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the messages were sent during the murder investigation. Here’s one exchange sent over the course of 22 minutes while officers were surveilling McGee, Allen, Pugh and Windom eating at a barbecue restaurant in Concord in March 2021:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Antioch police officer Eric Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Sooo many black peolpe (sic).”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Antioch police officer Jonathan Adams:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Bro. They all look the same.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>“Tell me about it. I feel like I’m at the zoo.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “They’re getting ice cream. Swarming to it like Hennessy. I bet its chicken.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Adams:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Could be ribs.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “For sure watermelon and kool aid. I hate these idiots.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other messages suggest Black people don’t like pools and can’t be seen in the dark, employing tropes used to demean Black people. Still, other messages use the N-word and include photos of Pugh and Allen in hospital beds after being injured by officers during their arrests. In the messages, the officers joke about kicking Allen’s head like a football.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shirelle Cobbs, Allen’s mother, shook with rage outside of the courtroom after the texts were read during a hearing. “If it was the other way around, my son would be under the courthouse or dead,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton has recommended at least 30 criminal cases for dismissal that involve police work by officers involved in the text messaging exchanges. But not in this case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the second RJA claim, the men asked Goldstein to dismiss all the enhancements and to downgrade a number of the top charges. They argued that the racist text messages made it impossible for the investigating officers to have done their jobs free of bias. They argued that not only were the officers who sent the messages compromised but so was the entire police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In August, Claire Jean Kim, a UC Irvine political science professor and expert in racial bias, testified for the defense. The text messages included department supervisors. She said only in a department with an entrenched culture of racism would no one report the violations of department policy. And that, she said, is exactly what happened in the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The law can and must repudiate the decisions made by such decision-makers, both for the sake of the defendant and for the community that rests its trust in the justice system,” she told the court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11961176\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11961176\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Two people with their hair in buns stand together looking at the camera in an outdoor setting.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Vienna Peterson Joiner (right) and Mariah Thomas drove up from Los Angeles to be in the courtroom during Eric Windom’s Racial Justice Act hearing in Martinez on Sept. 8, 2023. \u003ccite>(Annelise Finney/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Vienna Peterson Joiner was frequently in the gallery watching Windom, her son, closely. She told KQED she was trying to decipher how he was feeling and whether he’d eaten by the way he sat in his chair. Peterson Joiner and Windom are not allowed to speak at his court appearances.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want to run up there and hug him,” she said. “I want to tell [the court] what we know about Eric.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She drove to Martinez from Los Angeles for court dates, sometimes stopping to pick up her son’s fiance, Mariah Thomas, and their 1-year-old daughter. When Windom was a toddler, his father was incarcerated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His own experience with his father and his current situation and lack of ability to be fully there for his child now is weighing on him,” Kuluk told KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Thomas, the disruption to building a family with Windom is painful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He’s being held by people who don’t like the color of his skin,” she said. “That’s really what it boils down to because if these people were white, they would’ve been home. They would’ve been with their family.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Peterson Joiner said it was a relief when the judge dropped the gang enhancement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was glad that the judge did see that and paid attention to what was actually really going on,” she said. “People think that just because slavery ended, racism was pulled out at the root. But it wasn’t.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Data is the mechanism\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Natasha Minsker, a criminal justice reform policy consultant, said Becton’s willingness to provide data on charging practices has made the county a hot spot for attorneys testing the limits of the RJA using statistical evidence of discriminatory treatment. She, like Kuluk, is a member of the Racial Justice Act Implementation Working Group, a collection of advocates, attorneys and policymakers moving to bring claims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As of Jan. 1, people who are currently and formerly incarcerated are now able to challenge their convictions using the RJA. Minsker said more than three-quarters of the state’s prison population — about 90,000 people — could have viable claims. If implemented, she said, the law could help end mass incarceration in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to get there, defense attorneys need more funding and more data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were incredibly cooperative,” Kuluk said of Becton’s office. “That’s not what has been happening in many other counties in California where DA’s offices have been hostile to public records requests that they interpret as potentially leading to Racial Justice Act claims.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cities and counties aren’t currently required to collect data on the race of defendants or to make that data public. According to a statewide survey conducted by the reparations task force, 12 out of 57 responding county DA offices, including Sacramento, do not collect data on an accused person’s race, making RJA claims extremely challenging, if not impossible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County, home to the Vallejo Police Department, did not respond to the survey. In October, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11964674/trust-has-been-broken-california-demands-vallejo-police-reforms-citing-major-rights-violations\">the state Department of Justice expanded oversight of the Vallejo police\u003c/a> after the department failed to comply with the vast majority of court-mandated reforms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Without access to data, the promise of the [Racial Justice] Act has the potential to ring hollow to many,” the task force wrote in its report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside tag=\"racial-justice, racism\" label=\"More Related Stories\"]Among the 115 policy proposals suggested by the task force are \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/ch28-ca-reparations.pdf\">a series meant to strengthen and expand the Racial Justice Act (PDF)\u003c/a>, including additional funding to help defense attorneys hire data analysts, penalties for district attorneys who fail to provide complete data and calls to fund the Justice Data Accountability and Transparency Act fully. The law, passed in 2022 and set to go into effect in 2027, will require district attorneys to report case data, including the race of the defendant and the victim, to the state DOJ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you can bring irrefutable evidence of anti-Black bias within the criminal justice system to a court, then they will have no choice but to respond and to right the wrongs,” said Holder, who is also the president of the Equal Justice Society, an Oakland-based racial justice nonprofit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recently, Becton hired an analyst to guide the office’s data collection and preservation practices. In response to Windom’s claim, the office also established a committee review system for evaluating all special circumstances charges on articulable, race-neutral grounds before they are filed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is the power of the Racial Justice Act,” Minsker said. “It makes all actors in the justice system responsible for pushing forward racial justice.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, the California DOJ published the state’s first-ever race-blind charging guidelines for prosecutors. A state law passed in 2022 will require county prosecutors to institute race-blind charging practices starting next year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959229\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11959229\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Two people hold signs, one depicting a man with a deep wound to his head, as one of the people speaks emphatically in an outdoor setting.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kathryn Wade (left) and Carolyn Simmons speak out against the police violence that Wade says her son, Malad Baldwin, experienced at the hands of the Antioch Police Department at a rally in front of the AF Bray Courthouse in Martinez on Aug. 25, 2023. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For some, the recent RJA successes in Contra Costa come with a sting. At each court date for Windom’s RJA hearing, Hawkins’ family members were there, including his mother, Brandi Griffin. For six months after he was shot outside of their Antioch home, she kept him on life support, hoping her son, who she described as free-spirited, would recover.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our family has been sacrificed based on what the Antioch Police Department has done,” said Griffin, who told KQED that the case has stripped her faith in the justice system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In front of the courthouse in July, she shouted at a scrum of reporters, her voice strained with grief and rage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t give a shit about no racist shit!” she said. “What about my son?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "The Racial Justice Act was designed to radically reshape how our criminal justice system handles race. Contra Costa County has become a hot spot for cases testing the limits of the law. ",
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"title": "California's Groundbreaking Racial Justice Act Cuts Its Teeth in Contra Costa | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The effort to change the fundamental way race is considered in the California justice system received a jolt last week when a Contra Costa Superior Court judge \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974853/judge-finds-8-antioch-police-officers-tainted-by-racial-bias-reduces-criminal-charges\">ruled that racism within the Antioch Police Department tainted a murder investigation\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Feb. 5, Judge David Goldstein, a former public defender, removed all gang enhancements that could have resulted in life without parole sentences for the four men charged with the murder. Defense attorneys used the California Racial Justice Act to argue that racism tainted the handling of the case, from the murder investigation to the charges given to the four defendants, all of whom are Black and in their early 20s.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "‘People think that just because slavery ended, racism was pulled out at the root. But it wasn’t.’",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>It was the second time Goldstein ruled that anti-Black bias had shaped elements of the case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Race has been a mostly silent character in criminal courtrooms because race couldn’t be raised explicitly in court proceedings to defend someone accused of a crime until the RJA. The law, enacted in 2020, is the first of its kind in the country. Over several months, a KQED reporter attended the RJA hearings in the case. KQED also spoke with defense attorneys, prosecutors and community members about how the law is changing the way race is recognized in courtrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of July, four young men in yellow jumpsuits were spread across the courtroom as the afternoon sun streamed through windows behind Goldstein’s bench. Keyshawn McGee and Trent Allen sat in the jury box. Eric Windom and Terryonn Pugh were tucked in around the far end of the attorney’s table.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Behind them, the gallery was packed. The hallway outside the courtroom was filled with an overflow of family members, reporters and curious attorneys taking advantage of breaks between court appearances to get a glimpse of the historic hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The four men were charged with an alleged gang-related murder and attempted murder. The murder charge included five enhancements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here’s what happened: On March 9, 2021, police allege that the four men shot a car 40 times in a drive-by shooting on a residential street in Antioch. Arnold Marcel Hawkins, 22, was killed and another man was wounded. The shooting was allegedly part of a long-running feud between two East Bay gangs. The arrests of the men \u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80Gb7Z1vaLM\">were heralded by East Bay law enforcement\u003c/a> as a meaningful step toward reducing gun violence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Updated last year, the RJA made two major changes to existing state law. First, it created a way for defense attorneys to raise racism in court to defend someone accused of a crime. Second, it broadened what kind of evidence the court can consider to include indications of implicit bias, usually an analysis of the outcomes of similar cases that reveal the preferential or discriminatory treatment of one demographic group or another.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Contra Costa County, a growing number of RJA claims have recently gained traction. The ruling in the case against McGee, Allen, Pugh and Windom was the third time a Contra Costa judge has sided with the RJA, which allows judges to exclude witness testimony and drop charges, among other options.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It will hopefully be a model for defendants across the state,” said Evan Kuluk, Windom’s attorney. “If the police who investigated their case were racially biased, used excessive force or spoke about them in racially discriminatory ways, there truly is a remedy available.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The California Reparations Task Force submitted a \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/ab3121/report\">1,000-page report\u003c/a> to the state Legislature last summer, which included provisions to strengthen the RJA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The heart of implicit bias is when racism becomes so endemic, so pervasive, so enduring, so intractable, that it’s normal course,” Donald Tamaki, an attorney and task force member, told KQED. “So how do you disrupt that?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11974445/california-reparations-backers-applaud-bills-even-without-big-cash-payouts\">members of California’s legislative Black Caucus introduced a package of bills\u003c/a>, including four proposed changes to the state’s justice system. The proposed legislation does not include cash payments, but Tamaki and fellow task member Lisa Holder said policies like the RJA are just as important to reducing racial disparities as cutting a check.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11971366\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11971366\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"A person in a dark suit stands in front of a large outdoor flight of brick stairs.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/01/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-11-KQED.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Evan Kuluk, a public defender who used the California Racial Justice Act to argue that racism in the Antioch Police Department tainted a murder investigation, in front of the Wakefield Taylor Courthouse in Martinez on Aug. 25, 2023. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003ch2>The district attorney\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Last spring, Kuluk was focused on how Contra Contra County district attorneys choose to add gang enhancements to murder charges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve handled a lot of cases with gang allegations in this county and saw what I believe to be a disproportionate number of Black young men, especially from Richmond and Antioch, being charged with gang allegations,” said Kuluk, a public defender for 15 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>As a member of the county’s Alternate Defender Office, Kuluk was assigned to represent Windom, now 24, who was pursuing a music career at the time of his arrest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kuluk and Windom requested charging records from Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton. With the help of a UC Irvine statistician, they found that from 2015–2022, Black men accused of gang-related murders were 44% more likely to be charged with enhancements than defendants of other races accused of similar gang-related murders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Because they carry mandatory LWOP, the filing of special circumstances is an assertion that an individual is irredeemable,” Kuluk told KQED, referring to a life without the possibility of parole sentence. “It is beyond unfair and unacceptable for the government to more frequently deem Black people unworthy to ever get the opportunity to prove their redemption to a parole board.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton’s office disputed Kuluk’s findings, but in May, Windom and his co-defendants convinced the court that the district attorney had applied the enhancement in a biased way. The gang enhancement was dismissed. It was the first time in the United States, a country where Black residents are \u003ca href=\"https://www.sentencingproject.org/reports/the-color-of-justice-racial-and-ethnic-disparity-in-state-prisons-the-sentencing-project/\">five times more likely to be incarcerated in state prison than white residents\u003c/a>, that an argument of implicit bias in the justice system resulted in a charge being dropped from a criminal case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa Chief Assistant District Attorney Simon O’Connell said he doubted anyone in the office was knowingly targeting Black defendants for harsher punishment. But he said the RJA challenge gave the DA a reason to look more closely at their charging data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We don’t know what we don’t know,” he said. “It was important for us to start looking at historical data to see if, in fact, there were implicit biases and trends in our data, which would be surprising to us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>The police\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Windom and his three co-defendants had a second RJA hearing related to racist text messages uncovered by an FBI probe into alleged criminal activity by the Antioch and Pittsburg police departments.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the messages were sent during the murder investigation. Here’s one exchange sent over the course of 22 minutes while officers were surveilling McGee, Allen, Pugh and Windom eating at a barbecue restaurant in Concord in March 2021:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Antioch police officer Eric Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Sooo many black peolpe (sic).”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Antioch police officer Jonathan Adams:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Bro. They all look the same.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough: \u003c/strong>\u003cem>“Tell me about it. I feel like I’m at the zoo.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “They’re getting ice cream. Swarming to it like Hennessy. I bet its chicken.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Adams:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “Could be ribs.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px\">\u003cstrong>Rombough:\u003c/strong>\u003cem> “For sure watermelon and kool aid. I hate these idiots.”\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other messages suggest Black people don’t like pools and can’t be seen in the dark, employing tropes used to demean Black people. Still, other messages use the N-word and include photos of Pugh and Allen in hospital beds after being injured by officers during their arrests. In the messages, the officers joke about kicking Allen’s head like a football.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shirelle Cobbs, Allen’s mother, shook with rage outside of the courtroom after the texts were read during a hearing. “If it was the other way around, my son would be under the courthouse or dead,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Becton has recommended at least 30 criminal cases for dismissal that involve police work by officers involved in the text messaging exchanges. But not in this case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the second RJA claim, the men asked Goldstein to dismiss all the enhancements and to downgrade a number of the top charges. They argued that the racist text messages made it impossible for the investigating officers to have done their jobs free of bias. They argued that not only were the officers who sent the messages compromised but so was the entire police department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In August, Claire Jean Kim, a UC Irvine political science professor and expert in racial bias, testified for the defense. The text messages included department supervisors. She said only in a department with an entrenched culture of racism would no one report the violations of department policy. And that, she said, is exactly what happened in the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The law can and must repudiate the decisions made by such decision-makers, both for the sake of the defendant and for the community that rests its trust in the justice system,” she told the court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11961176\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11961176\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"Two people with their hair in buns stand together looking at the camera in an outdoor setting.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/09/230914-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-AF-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Vienna Peterson Joiner (right) and Mariah Thomas drove up from Los Angeles to be in the courtroom during Eric Windom’s Racial Justice Act hearing in Martinez on Sept. 8, 2023. \u003ccite>(Annelise Finney/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Vienna Peterson Joiner was frequently in the gallery watching Windom, her son, closely. She told KQED she was trying to decipher how he was feeling and whether he’d eaten by the way he sat in his chair. Peterson Joiner and Windom are not allowed to speak at his court appearances.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I want to run up there and hug him,” she said. “I want to tell [the court] what we know about Eric.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She drove to Martinez from Los Angeles for court dates, sometimes stopping to pick up her son’s fiance, Mariah Thomas, and their 1-year-old daughter. When Windom was a toddler, his father was incarcerated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“His own experience with his father and his current situation and lack of ability to be fully there for his child now is weighing on him,” Kuluk told KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For Thomas, the disruption to building a family with Windom is painful.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“He’s being held by people who don’t like the color of his skin,” she said. “That’s really what it boils down to because if these people were white, they would’ve been home. They would’ve been with their family.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Peterson Joiner said it was a relief when the judge dropped the gang enhancement.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I was glad that the judge did see that and paid attention to what was actually really going on,” she said. “People think that just because slavery ended, racism was pulled out at the root. But it wasn’t.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Data is the mechanism\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Natasha Minsker, a criminal justice reform policy consultant, said Becton’s willingness to provide data on charging practices has made the county a hot spot for attorneys testing the limits of the RJA using statistical evidence of discriminatory treatment. She, like Kuluk, is a member of the Racial Justice Act Implementation Working Group, a collection of advocates, attorneys and policymakers moving to bring claims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As of Jan. 1, people who are currently and formerly incarcerated are now able to challenge their convictions using the RJA. Minsker said more than three-quarters of the state’s prison population — about 90,000 people — could have viable claims. If implemented, she said, the law could help end mass incarceration in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But to get there, defense attorneys need more funding and more data.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They were incredibly cooperative,” Kuluk said of Becton’s office. “That’s not what has been happening in many other counties in California where DA’s offices have been hostile to public records requests that they interpret as potentially leading to Racial Justice Act claims.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cities and counties aren’t currently required to collect data on the race of defendants or to make that data public. According to a statewide survey conducted by the reparations task force, 12 out of 57 responding county DA offices, including Sacramento, do not collect data on an accused person’s race, making RJA claims extremely challenging, if not impossible.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Solano County, home to the Vallejo Police Department, did not respond to the survey. In October, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11964674/trust-has-been-broken-california-demands-vallejo-police-reforms-citing-major-rights-violations\">the state Department of Justice expanded oversight of the Vallejo police\u003c/a> after the department failed to comply with the vast majority of court-mandated reforms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Without access to data, the promise of the [Racial Justice] Act has the potential to ring hollow to many,” the task force wrote in its report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Among the 115 policy proposals suggested by the task force are \u003ca href=\"https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/media/ch28-ca-reparations.pdf\">a series meant to strengthen and expand the Racial Justice Act (PDF)\u003c/a>, including additional funding to help defense attorneys hire data analysts, penalties for district attorneys who fail to provide complete data and calls to fund the Justice Data Accountability and Transparency Act fully. The law, passed in 2022 and set to go into effect in 2027, will require district attorneys to report case data, including the race of the defendant and the victim, to the state DOJ.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you can bring irrefutable evidence of anti-Black bias within the criminal justice system to a court, then they will have no choice but to respond and to right the wrongs,” said Holder, who is also the president of the Equal Justice Society, an Oakland-based racial justice nonprofit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Recently, Becton hired an analyst to guide the office’s data collection and preservation practices. In response to Windom’s claim, the office also established a committee review system for evaluating all special circumstances charges on articulable, race-neutral grounds before they are filed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“This is the power of the Racial Justice Act,” Minsker said. “It makes all actors in the justice system responsible for pushing forward racial justice.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, the California DOJ published the state’s first-ever race-blind charging guidelines for prosecutors. A state law passed in 2022 will require county prosecutors to institute race-blind charging practices starting next year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11959229\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11959229\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"Two people hold signs, one depicting a man with a deep wound to his head, as one of the people speaks emphatically in an outdoor setting.\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled-1920x1280.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/08/230825-ANTIOCH-RACIAL-JUSTICE-HEARING-MD-03-KQED-scaled.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kathryn Wade (left) and Carolyn Simmons speak out against the police violence that Wade says her son, Malad Baldwin, experienced at the hands of the Antioch Police Department at a rally in front of the AF Bray Courthouse in Martinez on Aug. 25, 2023. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For some, the recent RJA successes in Contra Costa come with a sting. At each court date for Windom’s RJA hearing, Hawkins’ family members were there, including his mother, Brandi Griffin. For six months after he was shot outside of their Antioch home, she kept him on life support, hoping her son, who she described as free-spirited, would recover.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our family has been sacrificed based on what the Antioch Police Department has done,” said Griffin, who told KQED that the case has stripped her faith in the justice system.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In front of the courthouse in July, she shouted at a scrum of reporters, her voice strained with grief and rage.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I don’t give a shit about no racist shit!” she said. “What about my son?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Antioch police officers who \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947876/antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years\">sent racist text messages\u003c/a> are seeking additional defense protections and to avoid testifying altogether, as cases questioning whether racism factored into arrests they made get their day in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This comes as lawyers for four men accused of murder and attempted murder in a 2021 shooting sought to dismiss the charges against their clients during a hearing on Friday. They argued the messages sent by the investigating officers prove that the officers had a racial bias against the men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing is one of the first major tests of the \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB2542&search_keywords=racial+justice+act\">Racial Justice Act\u003c/a>, a 2021 California law prohibiting the state from seeking a conviction based on race. It’s also the first time officers involved in the texting scandal are set to publicly speak about the fiasco.[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Ellen McDonnell, public defender, Contra Costa County\"]‘It’s critical that there be a full hearing and that each officer be questioned regarding their role in these text messages and the way they handled policing in this case.’[/pullquote]In the last few months, an ongoing federal investigation into criminal wrongdoing in the Antioch Police Department \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/07/15/im-already-good-at-racial-profiling-new-batch-of-antioch-cops-texts-show-how-much-racism-and-policing-intertwined/\">uncovered hundreds of racist text messages\u003c/a> sent between officers, \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\">reported first by the East Bay Times\u003c/a>. Nearly half of the police officers in the department were named in connection to the texts, with the majority of messages being sent between 2020 and 2021. The texts used racial slurs to describe Black and Latino Antioch residents, including Police Chief Steven Ford and Mayor Lamar Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the texts talk specifically about two of the four defendants in Friday’s hearing. All four are young Black men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the text messages, officers referred to the men using the n-word, joked about assaulting them during their arrests and shared photos of the injured men in their hospital beds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Police attorneys argued that the officers — subpoenaed to appear as witnesses — should have their own lawyers present to defend them. Typically, witnesses answer questions from the district attorney and lawyers for the defendants and do not have their own lawyers present. In a packed courtroom on Friday, an attorney for the officers, Nicole Pifari, said that if the court found the nine officers to be racist, they would suffer “instantaneous, far reaching and likely permanent damage” to their reputations and employment opportunities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She requested the officers’ attorneys be allowed to ask their own questions and call their own witnesses to defend the officers during the hearing — steps she said were essential to providing the full context of the message exchanges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you are accused of something very serious, you have the right to defend yourself,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[aside postID=\"news_11947876,news_11946168,news_11946551\" label=\"Related Stories\"]Presiding Superior Court Judge David Goldstein agreed with the principle but said the Racial Justice Act does not provide for officers to have their own defense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said that if the court rules that the officers acted out of racism, it would not be the ruling that made the officers racist, but the underlying evidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He denied her request, but agreed that officers’ attorneys could be present to advise their clients on whether or not to invoke the Fifth Amendment: the officers’ right to stay silent if answering a question might incriminate them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That, of course, is if the officers testify at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawyers for Chief Ford — also subpoenaed to testify — successfully argued to excuse the chief from testimony because he joined the department after the text messages were sent. Last Wednesday, the chief \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=654987546653981&set=a.228771749275565\">announced that he will retire on Aug. 11\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additionally, at least five of the nine subpoenaed officers are claiming they are injured and cannot make it to court, \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/07/18/antioch-claims-subpoenaed-officers-have-industrial-injuries-to-avoid-testifying-about-racism-alleged-crimes/\">according to the East Bay Times\u003c/a>. But defense attorney Carmela Caramagno disputed that, saying her investigator saw allegedly injured officers driving tractors, hosting pool parties and walking leisurely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Like, what kind of medical leave you guys are on? For accountability, you guys need to be here,” said Shrielle Cobbs, the mother of defendant Trent Allen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa Public Defender Ellen McDonnell agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have a situation where officers exchanged animal memes of Black and brown people, where they explained that they were targeting Black people based on their race. And we have four young Black men on trial here,” she said on Friday. “It’s critical that there be a full hearing and that each officer be questioned regarding their role in these text messages and the way they handled policing in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seeing the messages was devastating for the families of the young men. Mariah Thomas is the fiancée of Eric Windom, and the cousin of Trent Allen, two of the defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They wanted to kill my cousin Trent Allen. Eric Windom, that’s my partner, my lover. The stuff that they said about them … it’s horrible,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing will continue on Aug. 25 and all nine officers are under subpoena to appear. If they do not appear when called, Judge Goldstein could explore other ways to compel them to testify.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Antioch police officers who \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11947876/antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years\">sent racist text messages\u003c/a> are seeking additional defense protections and to avoid testifying altogether, as cases questioning whether racism factored into arrests they made get their day in court.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This comes as lawyers for four men accused of murder and attempted murder in a 2021 shooting sought to dismiss the charges against their clients during a hearing on Friday. They argued the messages sent by the investigating officers prove that the officers had a racial bias against the men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing is one of the first major tests of the \u003ca href=\"https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB2542&search_keywords=racial+justice+act\">Racial Justice Act\u003c/a>, a 2021 California law prohibiting the state from seeking a conviction based on race. It’s also the first time officers involved in the texting scandal are set to publicly speak about the fiasco.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In the last few months, an ongoing federal investigation into criminal wrongdoing in the Antioch Police Department \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/07/15/im-already-good-at-racial-profiling-new-batch-of-antioch-cops-texts-show-how-much-racism-and-policing-intertwined/\">uncovered hundreds of racist text messages\u003c/a> sent between officers, \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\">reported first by the East Bay Times\u003c/a>. Nearly half of the police officers in the department were named in connection to the texts, with the majority of messages being sent between 2020 and 2021. The texts used racial slurs to describe Black and Latino Antioch residents, including Police Chief Steven Ford and Mayor Lamar Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the texts talk specifically about two of the four defendants in Friday’s hearing. All four are young Black men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the text messages, officers referred to the men using the n-word, joked about assaulting them during their arrests and shared photos of the injured men in their hospital beds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Police attorneys argued that the officers — subpoenaed to appear as witnesses — should have their own lawyers present to defend them. Typically, witnesses answer questions from the district attorney and lawyers for the defendants and do not have their own lawyers present. In a packed courtroom on Friday, an attorney for the officers, Nicole Pifari, said that if the court found the nine officers to be racist, they would suffer “instantaneous, far reaching and likely permanent damage” to their reputations and employment opportunities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She requested the officers’ attorneys be allowed to ask their own questions and call their own witnesses to defend the officers during the hearing — steps she said were essential to providing the full context of the message exchanges.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you are accused of something very serious, you have the right to defend yourself,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Presiding Superior Court Judge David Goldstein agreed with the principle but said the Racial Justice Act does not provide for officers to have their own defense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said that if the court rules that the officers acted out of racism, it would not be the ruling that made the officers racist, but the underlying evidence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He denied her request, but agreed that officers’ attorneys could be present to advise their clients on whether or not to invoke the Fifth Amendment: the officers’ right to stay silent if answering a question might incriminate them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That, of course, is if the officers testify at all.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lawyers for Chief Ford — also subpoenaed to testify — successfully argued to excuse the chief from testimony because he joined the department after the text messages were sent. Last Wednesday, the chief \u003ca href=\"https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=654987546653981&set=a.228771749275565\">announced that he will retire on Aug. 11\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Additionally, at least five of the nine subpoenaed officers are claiming they are injured and cannot make it to court, \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/07/18/antioch-claims-subpoenaed-officers-have-industrial-injuries-to-avoid-testifying-about-racism-alleged-crimes/\">according to the East Bay Times\u003c/a>. But defense attorney Carmela Caramagno disputed that, saying her investigator saw allegedly injured officers driving tractors, hosting pool parties and walking leisurely.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Like, what kind of medical leave you guys are on? For accountability, you guys need to be here,” said Shrielle Cobbs, the mother of defendant Trent Allen.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa Public Defender Ellen McDonnell agreed.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have a situation where officers exchanged animal memes of Black and brown people, where they explained that they were targeting Black people based on their race. And we have four young Black men on trial here,” she said on Friday. “It’s critical that there be a full hearing and that each officer be questioned regarding their role in these text messages and the way they handled policing in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Seeing the messages was devastating for the families of the young men. Mariah Thomas is the fiancée of Eric Windom, and the cousin of Trent Allen, two of the defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They wanted to kill my cousin Trent Allen. Eric Windom, that’s my partner, my lover. The stuff that they said about them … it’s horrible,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hearing will continue on Aug. 25 and all nine officers are under subpoena to appear. If they do not appear when called, Judge Goldstein could explore other ways to compel them to testify.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "antioch-police-racist-texting-scandal-confirms-what-many-black-and-brown-residents-have-decried-for-years",
"title": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years",
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"headTitle": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: This story includes quotations with racist and vulgar language as well as descriptions of violent attacks.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kathryn Wade marched up to the microphone in the City Council chambers before the meeting had even started with something to say. Wade is no stranger to the City Council in Antioch. She’s been coming here to talk and yell about the Antioch Police Department (APD) and their treatment of Black people for the past decade, since she was just one of a small handful of residents speaking up.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Gigi Crowder, executive director of NAMI Contra Costa\"]‘I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city. But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.’[/pullquote]Now, on this early Tuesday evening in April, she was far from alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Shut it all down,” Wade screamed across the packed room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch sits in the middle of a storm of scandal after the release of violent, racist, homophobic and sexist text messages by the city’s police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disturbing texts came to light during an investigation by the FBI and the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/09/10/exclusive-fbi-criminal-investigation-of-antioch-pittsburg-cops-grows-grand-jury-convening/\">alleged misconduct\u003c/a> by police in Antioch and the neighboring city of Pittsburg. Some of the issues being investigated include violent and excessive use of police dogs and eliciting false confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this month, the DA’s office released two reports \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">detailing the contents\u003c/a> of multiple\u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78905/Terryon-Pugh-Redacted-Investigative-Report\"> text message\u003c/a> exchanges written by 17 Antioch police officers from various time periods between 2019 and 2022. They include two texts from \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochpoa.org/about/presidents-message\">Rick Hoffman\u003c/a>, the president of Antioch’s police union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But far more officers were included on the text chains, according to a letter sent by Ellen McDonnell , the county’s chief public defender, to DA Diana Becton. According to McDonnell, 45 officers — almost half of the entire department — had received the texts and did nothing. At least 16 of those “are in leadership roles at APD as detectives, sergeants, and lieutenants,” McDonnell wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to listen,” Wade cried out in the council chambers. Her words were directed at the council members, Mayor Lamar Thorpe, and Police Chief Steven Ford, who joined the department last year, after most of the text messages were sent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to absorb a lot of people’s pain,” Wade told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Including her pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade’s son, Malad Baldwin, was 22-years-old when he was\u003ca href=\"https://www.courthousenews.com/cops-will-face-moms-distress-claim-in-sons-beating/\"> a victim of police violence\u003c/a>, she claims. In 2014, he was asleep in Wade’s car parked outside their house when police dragged him from the vehicle and beat him, according to a lawsuit filed against the city and the officers. In the complaint, Wade said she came out of the house to see them striking her son, and that they beat him until he lost consciousness. The suit claims that police slammed Baldwin into the sidewalk, spread his legs and repeatedly struck him there. “They hit him right in between his butt cheeks,” Wade said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police claim Baldwin was drunk and combative. He was charged with resisting arrest, but those charges were dropped. The lawsuit was settled out of court, with officers admitting no wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade says the beating changed her son. He was depressed, riddled with anxiety, unable to hold down a job. That was the first of several incidents between Baldwin and Antioch police. Wade says it was as if they were stalking him, harassing him every where he went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Baldwin died by suicide. Wade faults Antioch police for her son’s mental trauma, and ultimately for his death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police have not yet responded to requests for comment regarding subsequent interactions with Baldwin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Wade says, “It feels like my baby died all over again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because Baldwin was mentioned in the text messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city”\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Officers joked about Baldwin’s claims that they beat him on his backside, and about the department using deadly force. “But we kill more Mexicans than anything else. So Blacks can feel safe,” one officer texted. “Sorry. Reverse that,” he followed up a minute later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those are some of the tamer texts released.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You’ll hear people talk about “old Antioch” — which refers to the place it used to be: White, working class, a sundown town, where people of color knew not to be after dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But all that has changed. Antioch is now 36% white, 35% Latino, and 20% Black, according to the\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/antiochcitycalifornia/LND110210\"> 2020 census\u003c/a>. The shift happened both gradually and quickly. At first, Black people and other people of color moved here for the reasons everyone else did: bigger houses, better schools, a shot at the suburban American dream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947886\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two Black men, and one woman hold signs at a rally. One sign says: 'Fire & Decertify.' The others says 'We demand accountability.'\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dozens of community members and activists join a rally outside of the Antioch Police Department on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among members of the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In the past decade or so, gentrification and exploding housing costs in cities such as San Francisco and Oakland drove displaced poor people here — especially people of color. As Oakland’s Black population shrank, Antioch’s grew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new great migration is happening across America, changing the suburbs that have long been thought of as white space into the most diverse places in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Tuesday night, the special meeting of the City Council was narrowly focused on addressing the ballooning scandal resulting from the racist texts, with the council voting to audit the department’s internal affairs division, its hiring and promotional practices, and to perform an equity audit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those all passed easily, but the meeting, like the one the week before, was about more than just policy. People needed to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 100 people protested in front of the police station ahead of the council meeting, walking a stone’s throw from City Hall.[aside label=\"related coverage\" tag=\"antioch\"]“Antioch didn’t look like this, but it does now,” said Timothy Manly. “When everybody was fixing their issues in the ’60s, Antioch didn’t think that they’d have to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the ’60s, Antioch was almost entirely white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re just reaping what you sowed,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some people told stories of their own encounters with Antioch police, others spoke of the experiences of children and loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These individuals that have spoken tonight are victims of police brutality, they are victims of crimes,” Public Defender Ellen McDonnell said when it was her turn at the dais. “The community and our clients have been sounding the alarm about your police department for years and years and years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shayla Bowers talked about how important it was to name the officers. “Our Black and brown people, as you see in this room, we got names, we got banners, we are public about our deaths in our community,” she said. “We need to be public about these police officers that are doing harm in our community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city,” said Gigi Crowder, the executive director of NAMI Contra Costa, an affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and an Antioch resident. “But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She believed that, she told the council, because it wasn’t just demographics that were shifting — the balance of power was too.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>For a long time the Antioch’s leadership did not reflect its diversifying population. That changed in 2020, with a Black majority emerging on the five-person City Council, including Mayor Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform,” Thorpe reminded the council chambers, “people lost their collective minds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they could’ve hung me from the highest tree in Antioch they would have,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of pro-police, almost entirely white residents, many affiliated with a private Facebook group called “Back the Blue,” flooded the then-online-only council meetings, pushing back against the new majority, and any suggestions of police reform. They mounted a recall campaign against Thorpe, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/recall-of-antioch-mayor-dies-following-allegations-of-fraud\">which failed to gather enough signatures\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11887516/why-was-angelo-quintos-death-ruled-an-accident\">December 2020 death of Angelo Quinto\u003c/a> in the custody of Antioch police, the council voted for police to wear body cameras, a reform many police departments passed over a decade ago, but Antioch had long resisted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In one of the released texts, body cameras are mentioned. Discussing an arrest made with the Pittsburg Police Department, whose officers did have cameras, an Antioch officer wrote: “If Pitt didn’t have all those body cams and that was us … we would have f&*ked him up more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another police officer, Devon Wenger, responded, “I agree. That’s why I don’t like body cameras.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947926\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947926\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"A small group of Black women stand on the sidewalk holding signs and protesting racism among police in Antioch.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kiora Hansen and Della Currie join the protest in Antioch in front of the city’s police department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a statement to \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/US/city-antioch-police-officers-face-lawsuit-alleged-civil/story?id=98728222\">ABC News\u003c/a>, Wenger denied he was being racist, pointing out that he only sent that one text. “Out of both released reports, the initial 21-page-report and the secondary 14-page report, I just simply said I do not like body cams,” he told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To put it bluntly, that’s not racist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wenger also suggested that the investigation into Antioch police may have been “corrupted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>NPR’s requests to speak to the officers named in the DA’s report were either ignored or declined.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Thorpe shows up in the police text messages too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll buy someone a prime rib dinner at House of prime rib to 40 that mfr during the protest today,” one officer texted, referring to “the potential use of a .40mm less lethal launcher being utilized” on the mayor, the \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">DA’s report \u003c/a>explains. A .40mm weapon is a kind of gun that fires hard-foam projectiles. Their use \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-12/protesters-complain-about-excessive-force\">against protesters and for crowd control\u003c/a>, as well as their designation as less lethal, has been criticized.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That text was sent in June 2020, during the heart of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/06/05/867060621/being-black-in-america-we-have-a-place-in-this-world-too\">national uprising\u003c/a> over the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/05/27/862956646/george-floyds-death-stokes-call-for-minneapolis-officers-to-be-charged-with-murd\">murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer\u003c/a>. Another text referred to Floyd as “the gorilla who died.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The text messages continuously refer to Black people as “gorillas” and “monkeys,” and officers repeatedly texted photos of gorillas to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A young activist, Shagoofa Khan, prominent in organizing protests in Antioch, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11837708/a-hunger-strike-in-antioch-and-what-it-says-about-the-changing-suburbs\">a hunger strike in front of the police station\u003c/a>, was also mentioned in the texts. She “looks like an Arabian nights cum dumpster,” a sergeant wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same sergeant, Josh Evans, texted in reference to the arrest of a Black suspect, “I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four minutes later he texted again. “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’m only stopping them cuz they black’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The texts aren’t just filled with racist and sexist vitriol, they also seem to suggest possible civil rights violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On a group chat, one officer asks the others what they are doing. The response from another, “violating civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Racial profiling was a “modus operandi with respect to these officers,” civil rights lawyer John Burris claimed at a news conference on April 20, announcing a federal lawsuit against the city, the police department, and individual officers on behalf of a growing list of victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would stop people just because they were Black, they would harass them, they would search them, and ultimately arrest them if they thought they could get away with it,” he alleged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They didn’t want any kind of oral, written, videotape of the confession,” he went on. “They wanted the confession to be such that they could make up the confession and convince their superiors that the person has confessed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said he was also disturbed by text messages that suggested officers took pleasure in using violent force, especially on Black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris’ clients include those who say they were repeatedly targeted and falsely accused by Antioch police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adam Carpenter, one of the plaintiffs, was arrested for possession of a firearm by four of the officers named in the scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have been harassed and targeted and railroaded by the Antioch police department for the last 10 years,” Carpenter told a scrum of reporters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947885\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947885\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A young woman with a bullhorn leads protesters on the street holding signs.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shagoofa Khan leads a rally of dozens of community members from the Antioch Police Department to City Hall on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>According to the lawsuit, in the year before his arrest he was stopped by the same officers almost 10 times.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter spent 11 months in jail before all charges against him were dropped. The complaint alleges that one of the officers involved in Carpenter’s arrest texted, “I’m only stopping them cuz they black.” It alleges another wrote, “I sometimes just say people gave me a full confession when they didn’t. gets filed easier.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They have basically ruined my life,” Carpenter said. “I’ve not been able to get a job, and I’m a journeyman by trade, a painter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been devastating, like living in hell.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others shared similar stories, claiming patterns of harassment, planted evidence, and manufactured confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch city attorney as well as current and former police chiefs have not yet responded to requests for comment on the litigation.[pullquote align=\"right\" size=\"medium\" citation=\"Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe\"]‘In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform, people lost their collective minds.’[/pullquote]Michael Rains, a former police officer and lawyer who represents some, but not all, of the officers, responded with a brief statement. “I understand this story is newsworthy on a number of fronts,” he wrote, “including, from my perspective, whether the due process and privacy rights of officers were abandoned by the Court and District Attorney.” But he added that he has advised his clients not to speak publicly, and is himself not granting interviews “at the present time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Current Antioch Police Chief Steven Ford, who is Black, came from San Francisco to lead the department a year ago. At the first council meeting after the scandal broke, he said that he is trying not to reform, but to reframe policing there. “We’re going to shift how things are done structurally, how they are done politically, how they are done administratively,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No one can tell yet just how many \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946551/antiochs-racist-police-text-message-scandal-could-mean-dropped-charges-in-other-cases\">criminal cases might hang in the balance \u003c/a>after these revelations. Burris, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/congressmen-want-us-attorney-general-to-investigate-antioch-police\">alongside others\u003c/a> including two members of Congress, are calling for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter said that in a strange way, he was grateful to read all the texts. At least they confirmed for everyone else what he’d been experiencing for so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It has been the same for Kathryn Wade. Reading the texts may have reopened the wound of her son’s death, but at least, she says, “Everything is out in the open, now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=These+California+police+officers+have+created+a+scandal.+They+sent+racist+texts&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "Residents of color in this rapidly changing Bay Area suburb have long accused the police department of racism, corruption and abuse.",
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"title": "Antioch Police Racist Texting Scandal Confirms What Many Black and Brown Residents Have Decried for Years | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Warning: This story includes quotations with racist and vulgar language as well as descriptions of violent attacks.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kathryn Wade marched up to the microphone in the City Council chambers before the meeting had even started with something to say. Wade is no stranger to the City Council in Antioch. She’s been coming here to talk and yell about the Antioch Police Department (APD) and their treatment of Black people for the past decade, since she was just one of a small handful of residents speaking up.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Now, on this early Tuesday evening in April, she was far from alone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Shut it all down,” Wade screamed across the packed room.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch sits in the middle of a storm of scandal after the release of violent, racist, homophobic and sexist text messages by the city’s police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The disturbing texts came to light during an investigation by the FBI and the Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office into \u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/09/10/exclusive-fbi-criminal-investigation-of-antioch-pittsburg-cops-grows-grand-jury-convening/\">alleged misconduct\u003c/a> by police in Antioch and the neighboring city of Pittsburg. Some of the issues being investigated include violent and excessive use of police dogs and eliciting false confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this month, the DA’s office released two reports \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">detailing the contents\u003c/a> of multiple\u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78905/Terryon-Pugh-Redacted-Investigative-Report\"> text message\u003c/a> exchanges written by 17 Antioch police officers from various time periods between 2019 and 2022. They include two texts from \u003ca href=\"https://www.antiochpoa.org/about/presidents-message\">Rick Hoffman\u003c/a>, the president of Antioch’s police union.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But far more officers were included on the text chains, according to a letter sent by Ellen McDonnell , the county’s chief public defender, to DA Diana Becton. According to McDonnell, 45 officers — almost half of the entire department — had received the texts and did nothing. At least 16 of those “are in leadership roles at APD as detectives, sergeants, and lieutenants,” McDonnell wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to listen,” Wade cried out in the council chambers. Her words were directed at the council members, Mayor Lamar Thorpe, and Police Chief Steven Ford, who joined the department last year, after most of the text messages were sent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re going to have to absorb a lot of people’s pain,” Wade told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Including her pain.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade’s son, Malad Baldwin, was 22-years-old when he was\u003ca href=\"https://www.courthousenews.com/cops-will-face-moms-distress-claim-in-sons-beating/\"> a victim of police violence\u003c/a>, she claims. In 2014, he was asleep in Wade’s car parked outside their house when police dragged him from the vehicle and beat him, according to a lawsuit filed against the city and the officers. In the complaint, Wade said she came out of the house to see them striking her son, and that they beat him until he lost consciousness. The suit claims that police slammed Baldwin into the sidewalk, spread his legs and repeatedly struck him there. “They hit him right in between his butt cheeks,” Wade said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police claim Baldwin was drunk and combative. He was charged with resisting arrest, but those charges were dropped. The lawsuit was settled out of court, with officers admitting no wrongdoing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wade says the beating changed her son. He was depressed, riddled with anxiety, unable to hold down a job. That was the first of several incidents between Baldwin and Antioch police. Wade says it was as if they were stalking him, harassing him every where he went.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2020, Baldwin died by suicide. Wade faults Antioch police for her son’s mental trauma, and ultimately for his death.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Antioch police have not yet responded to requests for comment regarding subsequent interactions with Baldwin.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, Wade says, “It feels like my baby died all over again.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s because Baldwin was mentioned in the text messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city”\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Officers joked about Baldwin’s claims that they beat him on his backside, and about the department using deadly force. “But we kill more Mexicans than anything else. So Blacks can feel safe,” one officer texted. “Sorry. Reverse that,” he followed up a minute later.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those are some of the tamer texts released.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You’ll hear people talk about “old Antioch” — which refers to the place it used to be: White, working class, a sundown town, where people of color knew not to be after dark.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But all that has changed. Antioch is now 36% white, 35% Latino, and 20% Black, according to the\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/antiochcitycalifornia/LND110210\"> 2020 census\u003c/a>. The shift happened both gradually and quickly. At first, Black people and other people of color moved here for the reasons everyone else did: bigger houses, better schools, a shot at the suburban American dream.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947886\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947886\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"Two Black men, and one woman hold signs at a rally. One sign says: 'Fire & Decertify.' The others says 'We demand accountability.'\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64569_010_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dozens of community members and activists join a rally outside of the Antioch Police Department on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among members of the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In the past decade or so, gentrification and exploding housing costs in cities such as San Francisco and Oakland drove displaced poor people here — especially people of color. As Oakland’s Black population shrank, Antioch’s grew.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This new great migration is happening across America, changing the suburbs that have long been thought of as white space into the most diverse places in the nation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On this Tuesday night, the special meeting of the City Council was narrowly focused on addressing the ballooning scandal resulting from the racist texts, with the council voting to audit the department’s internal affairs division, its hiring and promotional practices, and to perform an equity audit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those all passed easily, but the meeting, like the one the week before, was about more than just policy. People needed to speak.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 100 people protested in front of the police station ahead of the council meeting, walking a stone’s throw from City Hall.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“Antioch didn’t look like this, but it does now,” said Timothy Manly. “When everybody was fixing their issues in the ’60s, Antioch didn’t think that they’d have to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the ’60s, Antioch was almost entirely white.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You’re just reaping what you sowed,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some people told stories of their own encounters with Antioch police, others spoke of the experiences of children and loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These individuals that have spoken tonight are victims of police brutality, they are victims of crimes,” Public Defender Ellen McDonnell said when it was her turn at the dais. “The community and our clients have been sounding the alarm about your police department for years and years and years.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Shayla Bowers talked about how important it was to name the officers. “Our Black and brown people, as you see in this room, we got names, we got banners, we are public about our deaths in our community,” she said. “We need to be public about these police officers that are doing harm in our community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I knew from the beginning that it was a racist city,” said Gigi Crowder, the executive director of NAMI Contra Costa, an affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, and an Antioch resident. “But then I believed that there was a possibility for change.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She believed that, she told the council, because it wasn’t just demographics that were shifting — the balance of power was too.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>For a long time the Antioch’s leadership did not reflect its diversifying population. That changed in 2020, with a Black majority emerging on the five-person City Council, including Mayor Thorpe.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“In 2020, when all I asked for was a community to look at policies to do police reform,” Thorpe reminded the council chambers, “people lost their collective minds.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If they could’ve hung me from the highest tree in Antioch they would have,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A group of pro-police, almost entirely white residents, many affiliated with a private Facebook group called “Back the Blue,” flooded the then-online-only council meetings, pushing back against the new majority, and any suggestions of police reform. They mounted a recall campaign against Thorpe, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/recall-of-antioch-mayor-dies-following-allegations-of-fraud\">which failed to gather enough signatures\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11887516/why-was-angelo-quintos-death-ruled-an-accident\">December 2020 death of Angelo Quinto\u003c/a> in the custody of Antioch police, the council voted for police to wear body cameras, a reform many police departments passed over a decade ago, but Antioch had long resisted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In one of the released texts, body cameras are mentioned. Discussing an arrest made with the Pittsburg Police Department, whose officers did have cameras, an Antioch officer wrote: “If Pitt didn’t have all those body cams and that was us … we would have f&*ked him up more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another police officer, Devon Wenger, responded, “I agree. That’s why I don’t like body cameras.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947926\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947926\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg\" alt=\"A small group of Black women stand on the sidewalk holding signs and protesting racism among police in Antioch.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64570_012_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kiora Hansen and Della Currie join the protest in Antioch in front of the city’s police department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In a statement to \u003ca href=\"https://abcnews.go.com/US/city-antioch-police-officers-face-lawsuit-alleged-civil/story?id=98728222\">ABC News\u003c/a>, Wenger denied he was being racist, pointing out that he only sent that one text. “Out of both released reports, the initial 21-page-report and the secondary 14-page report, I just simply said I do not like body cams,” he told them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To put it bluntly, that’s not racist.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Wenger also suggested that the investigation into Antioch police may have been “corrupted.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>NPR’s requests to speak to the officers named in the DA’s report were either ignored or declined.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Thorpe shows up in the police text messages too.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ll buy someone a prime rib dinner at House of prime rib to 40 that mfr during the protest today,” one officer texted, referring to “the potential use of a .40mm less lethal launcher being utilized” on the mayor, the \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">DA’s report \u003c/a>explains. A .40mm weapon is a kind of gun that fires hard-foam projectiles. Their use \u003ca href=\"https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-06-12/protesters-complain-about-excessive-force\">against protesters and for crowd control\u003c/a>, as well as their designation as less lethal, has been criticized.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That text was sent in June 2020, during the heart of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/06/05/867060621/being-black-in-america-we-have-a-place-in-this-world-too\">national uprising\u003c/a> over the \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/2020/05/27/862956646/george-floyds-death-stokes-call-for-minneapolis-officers-to-be-charged-with-murd\">murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer\u003c/a>. Another text referred to Floyd as “the gorilla who died.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The text messages continuously refer to Black people as “gorillas” and “monkeys,” and officers repeatedly texted photos of gorillas to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A young activist, Shagoofa Khan, prominent in organizing protests in Antioch, including \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11837708/a-hunger-strike-in-antioch-and-what-it-says-about-the-changing-suburbs\">a hunger strike in front of the police station\u003c/a>, was also mentioned in the texts. She “looks like an Arabian nights cum dumpster,” a sergeant wrote.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The same sergeant, Josh Evans, texted in reference to the arrest of a Black suspect, “I’ll bury that N*&*er in my fields.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four minutes later he texted again. “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>‘I’m only stopping them cuz they black’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>The texts aren’t just filled with racist and sexist vitriol, they also seem to suggest possible civil rights violations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On a group chat, one officer asks the others what they are doing. The response from another, “violating civil rights.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Racial profiling was a “modus operandi with respect to these officers,” civil rights lawyer John Burris claimed at a news conference on April 20, announcing a federal lawsuit against the city, the police department, and individual officers on behalf of a growing list of victims.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They would stop people just because they were Black, they would harass them, they would search them, and ultimately arrest them if they thought they could get away with it,” he alleged.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They didn’t want any kind of oral, written, videotape of the confession,” he went on. “They wanted the confession to be such that they could make up the confession and convince their superiors that the person has confessed.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris said he was also disturbed by text messages that suggested officers took pleasure in using violent force, especially on Black people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Burris’ clients include those who say they were repeatedly targeted and falsely accused by Antioch police officers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Adam Carpenter, one of the plaintiffs, was arrested for possession of a firearm by four of the officers named in the scandal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I have been harassed and targeted and railroaded by the Antioch police department for the last 10 years,” Carpenter told a scrum of reporters.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11947885\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1920px\">\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11947885\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg\" alt=\"A young woman with a bullhorn leads protesters on the street holding signs.\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1280\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut.jpg 1920w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2023/04/RS64575_022_KQED_AntiochPoliceRacistTextProtest_04182023-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shagoofa Khan leads a rally of dozens of community members from the Antioch Police Department to City Hall on April 18, 2023, to protest the racist and homophobic text messages shared among the department. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>According to the lawsuit, in the year before his arrest he was stopped by the same officers almost 10 times.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter spent 11 months in jail before all charges against him were dropped. The complaint alleges that one of the officers involved in Carpenter’s arrest texted, “I’m only stopping them cuz they black.” It alleges another wrote, “I sometimes just say people gave me a full confession when they didn’t. gets filed easier.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They have basically ruined my life,” Carpenter said. “I’ve not been able to get a job, and I’m a journeyman by trade, a painter.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s been devastating, like living in hell.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Others shared similar stories, claiming patterns of harassment, planted evidence, and manufactured confessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Antioch city attorney as well as current and former police chiefs have not yet responded to requests for comment on the litigation.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Michael Rains, a former police officer and lawyer who represents some, but not all, of the officers, responded with a brief statement. “I understand this story is newsworthy on a number of fronts,” he wrote, “including, from my perspective, whether the due process and privacy rights of officers were abandoned by the Court and District Attorney.” But he added that he has advised his clients not to speak publicly, and is himself not granting interviews “at the present time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Current Antioch Police Chief Steven Ford, who is Black, came from San Francisco to lead the department a year ago. At the first council meeting after the scandal broke, he said that he is trying not to reform, but to reframe policing there. “We’re going to shift how things are done structurally, how they are done politically, how they are done administratively,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>No one can tell yet just how many \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946551/antiochs-racist-police-text-message-scandal-could-mean-dropped-charges-in-other-cases\">criminal cases might hang in the balance \u003c/a>after these revelations. Burris, \u003ca href=\"https://www.ktvu.com/news/congressmen-want-us-attorney-general-to-investigate-antioch-police\">alongside others\u003c/a> including two members of Congress, are calling for the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the Antioch Police Department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carpenter said that in a strange way, he was grateful to read all the texts. At least they confirmed for everyone else what he’d been experiencing for so long.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It has been the same for Kathryn Wade. Reading the texts may have reopened the wound of her son’s death, but at least, she says, “Everything is out in the open, now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"fullattribution\">Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" src=\"https://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif?utmac=UA-5828686-4&utmdt=These+California+police+officers+have+created+a+scandal.+They+sent+racist+texts&utme=8(APIKey)9(MDAxOTAwOTE4MDEyMTkxMDAzNjczZDljZA004)\">\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003ci>This episode contains explicit, racist and offensive language, as well as descriptions of violence.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For years, police officers in the city of Antioch used racist and homophobic slurs with their colleagues in text messages, and openly bragged about targeting people of color with violence. These messages were released to the public in a Contra Costa County District Attorney report last week. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These racist texts were released as the department is already being investigated by federal authorities, and as a grand jury considers charging officers with fraud, assault under color of authority, bribery, and other charges. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nearly 1 in 5 police officers in Antioch are currently suspended. For longtime advocates of police reform in Antioch, these messages are a painful reminder of how deeply racism is embedded in the culture of their local police department.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3NXMUms\">\u003cem>Episode transcript\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guest: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/NateGartrell\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nate Gartrell,\u003c/a> East Bay Times courts reporter\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC7498104696&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Links: \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Exclusive: Inside the Antioch police department’s secret racist texting group\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/04/13/new-text-messages-show-antioch-gang-unit-boasted-about-injuring-suspects-kicking-heads-like-a-field-goal/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">New text messages show Antioch gang unit boasted about injuring suspects, kicking heads like a ‘field goal’\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\n\u003cp class=\"article-headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/read-antioch-police-racist-texts/3205051/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">District Attorney Investigative Reports Detail Alleged Antioch Police Racist Texts\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003c/div>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003ci>This episode contains explicit, racist and offensive language, as well as descriptions of violence.\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For years, police officers in the city of Antioch used racist and homophobic slurs with their colleagues in text messages, and openly bragged about targeting people of color with violence. These messages were released to the public in a Contra Costa County District Attorney report last week. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These racist texts were released as the department is already being investigated by federal authorities, and as a grand jury considers charging officers with fraud, assault under color of authority, bribery, and other charges. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nearly 1 in 5 police officers in Antioch are currently suspended. For longtime advocates of police reform in Antioch, these messages are a painful reminder of how deeply racism is embedded in the culture of their local police department.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://bit.ly/3NXMUms\">\u003cem>Episode transcript\u003c/em>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>Guest: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/NateGartrell\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nate Gartrell,\u003c/a> East Bay Times courts reporter\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cdiv class=\"card card--enclosed grey\">\n\u003cp id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm/?e=KQINC7498104696&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\n\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Links: \u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Exclusive: Inside the Antioch police department’s secret racist texting group\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/04/13/new-text-messages-show-antioch-gang-unit-boasted-about-injuring-suspects-kicking-heads-like-a-field-goal/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">New text messages show Antioch gang unit boasted about injuring suspects, kicking heads like a ‘field goal’\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\n\u003cp class=\"article-headline\">\u003ca href=\"https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/read-antioch-police-racist-texts/3205051/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">District Attorney Investigative Reports Detail Alleged Antioch Police Racist Texts\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\n\u003c/div>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s note: This story contains racist language.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge David Goldstein will decide by May 19 whether to dismiss gang enhancement charges against four Black men arrested in connection with a shooting in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorneys for the men had already filed motions to dismiss the charges on the grounds of the California Racial Justice Act, which prohibits racism in criminal prosecutions and sentencing. The argument was bolstered this week by a spiraling racist text message scandal within the Antioch Police Department. Some of the text messages contain references to the four men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The racist texts surfaced during an ongoing investigation by the FBI and Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton into misconduct by police officers in Antioch and Pittsburg, including officers misusing police dogs, falsifying education records to obtain pay bumps and eliciting false confessions. The \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">district attorney’s report (PDF)\u003c/a>, which contains racist, misogynistic and violent language and imagery, was obtained by KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eleven members of the Antioch Police Department are on leave after the investigation. At least 14 officers — sergeants, detectives and supervisors — allegedly sent and received racist memes and text messages for four years, according to the report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation arrives on top of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Latest-Oakland-police-chief-is-out-after-two-days-8310286.php\">numerous racist text scandals that have rocked police departments\u003c/a> and communities across the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our clients are more seriously charged than similarly situated defendants of other races, non-Black defendants,” said Evan Kuluk, deputy public defender with the Alternate Defender Office for Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The case surrounds four alleged members of an East Oakland-based gang who were charged in August 2021 with conspiracy to murder rival gang members and attempted murder in connection with a March 2021 homicide in Antioch.[pullquote size='medium' align='left' citation=\"Evan Kuluk, deputy public defender, Alternate Defender Office for Contra Costa County\"]‘Our clients are more seriously charged than similarly situated defendants of other races, non-Black defendants.’[/pullquote]Attorneys have been in litigation for the last six months over alleged racial disparities in gang charges in homicide cases, Kuluk said. \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\">The East Bay Times first reported on the horrific text messages.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About 20% of APD’s officers are currently suspended, and the text messages are likely to compromise many more Contra Costa criminal cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the texts, officers bragged about falsifying confessions and assaulting Black residents, and rampantly used racist stereotypes about the communities they were sworn to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In April 2020, Sgt. Josh Evans texted officer Morteza Amiri, “I’ll bury that n—r in my fields.” The report notes that Amiri laughed at the above comment, and then Evans responded, “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”[aside label=\"Related Stories\" tag=\"racist-texts\"]Amiri replied, “haha there’s no accidents with you on that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Why would it take a legislative enactment to get 20 officers to understand that it’s their job to intercede when their fellow officers are abusing, assaulting members of their community, using racial epithets,” said Carmela Caramagno, an attorney who represents one of the defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The messages include direct threats against Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe, who is Black and Latino. In 2020, John Ramirez sent a text to fellow APD officers saying he would “buy someone a prime rib dinner” if they shot at Thorpe with a rubber-bullet 40 mm launcher at a protest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t say those things unless there’s an institution or a culture that says that’s OK. And so we have to fix that,” Thorpe said in response to the messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Saturday, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946168/racist-text-messages-lead-antioch-mayor-to-call-for-independent-audit-of-police-department\">Thorpe called for an audit of internal affairs complaints\u003c/a>. The mayor, who said that the audit should include all complaints made against police officers over the last six to eight years, also requested a study of demographic data on arrests and use of force.[pullquote size='medium' align='left' citation=\"Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe\"]‘You can’t say those things unless there’s an institution or a culture that says that’s OK. And so we have to fix that.’[/pullquote]The Antioch Police Department did not return a request for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Caramagno said she plans to file a motion to dismiss all the charges against her client.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you look at the text messages, you’ve got at least 20 officers, whether they’re sending texts or receiving texts,” she said. “So far, I’m not aware of a single officer coming forward to call out this behavior, stop the behavior or intercede on the defendant’s behalf. If that’s not egregious governmental conduct, I don’t know what it is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporters Tara Siler and Sara Hossaini contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Editor’s note, April 14:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">published the district attorney’s investigative report on April 12 (PDF)\u003c/a> in the interest of providing our audiences with unvarnished access to the content of the racist, misogynistic and violent text messages allegedly sent by members of the Antioch Police Department. KQED has redacted the version of the report we obtained to exclude information also withheld in court records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office released a heavily censored version of the report on April 13. That version can be viewed \u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78884/Disclosure-Report-CCCDAO-and-Court-Ordered-Redactions\">here (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Editor’s note: This story contains racist language.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge David Goldstein will decide by May 19 whether to dismiss gang enhancement charges against four Black men arrested in connection with a shooting in Antioch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorneys for the men had already filed motions to dismiss the charges on the grounds of the California Racial Justice Act, which prohibits racism in criminal prosecutions and sentencing. The argument was bolstered this week by a spiraling racist text message scandal within the Antioch Police Department. Some of the text messages contain references to the four men.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The racist texts surfaced during an ongoing investigation by the FBI and Contra Costa County District Attorney Diana Becton into misconduct by police officers in Antioch and Pittsburg, including officers misusing police dogs, falsifying education records to obtain pay bumps and eliciting false confessions. The \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">district attorney’s report (PDF)\u003c/a>, which contains racist, misogynistic and violent language and imagery, was obtained by KQED.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eleven members of the Antioch Police Department are on leave after the investigation. At least 14 officers — sergeants, detectives and supervisors — allegedly sent and received racist memes and text messages for four years, according to the report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The revelation arrives on top of \u003ca href=\"https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Latest-Oakland-police-chief-is-out-after-two-days-8310286.php\">numerous racist text scandals that have rocked police departments\u003c/a> and communities across the Bay Area.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Our clients are more seriously charged than similarly situated defendants of other races, non-Black defendants,” said Evan Kuluk, deputy public defender with the Alternate Defender Office for Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The case surrounds four alleged members of an East Oakland-based gang who were charged in August 2021 with conspiracy to murder rival gang members and attempted murder in connection with a March 2021 homicide in Antioch.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Attorneys have been in litigation for the last six months over alleged racial disparities in gang charges in homicide cases, Kuluk said. \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/11/exclusive-inside-the-antioch-police-departments-secret-racist-texting-group/\">The East Bay Times first reported on the horrific text messages.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>About 20% of APD’s officers are currently suspended, and the text messages are likely to compromise many more Contra Costa criminal cases.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the texts, officers bragged about falsifying confessions and assaulting Black residents, and rampantly used racist stereotypes about the communities they were sworn to protect.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In April 2020, Sgt. Josh Evans texted officer Morteza Amiri, “I’ll bury that n—r in my fields.” The report notes that Amiri laughed at the above comment, and then Evans responded, “And yes… it was a hard R on purpose.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Amiri replied, “haha there’s no accidents with you on that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Why would it take a legislative enactment to get 20 officers to understand that it’s their job to intercede when their fellow officers are abusing, assaulting members of their community, using racial epithets,” said Carmela Caramagno, an attorney who represents one of the defendants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The messages include direct threats against Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe, who is Black and Latino. In 2020, John Ramirez sent a text to fellow APD officers saying he would “buy someone a prime rib dinner” if they shot at Thorpe with a rubber-bullet 40 mm launcher at a protest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“You can’t say those things unless there’s an institution or a culture that says that’s OK. And so we have to fix that,” Thorpe said in response to the messages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>On Saturday, \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11946168/racist-text-messages-lead-antioch-mayor-to-call-for-independent-audit-of-police-department\">Thorpe called for an audit of internal affairs complaints\u003c/a>. The mayor, who said that the audit should include all complaints made against police officers over the last six to eight years, also requested a study of demographic data on arrests and use of force.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>The Antioch Police Department did not return a request for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Caramagno said she plans to file a motion to dismiss all the charges against her client.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you look at the text messages, you’ve got at least 20 officers, whether they’re sending texts or receiving texts,” she said. “So far, I’m not aware of a single officer coming forward to call out this behavior, stop the behavior or intercede on the defendant’s behalf. If that’s not egregious governmental conduct, I don’t know what it is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>KQED reporters Tara Siler and Sara Hossaini contributed to this report.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Editor’s note, April 14:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>KQED \u003ca href=\"https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23778279/disclosure-report-court-redactions-final.pdf\">published the district attorney’s investigative report on April 12 (PDF)\u003c/a> in the interest of providing our audiences with unvarnished access to the content of the racist, misogynistic and violent text messages allegedly sent by members of the Antioch Police Department. KQED has redacted the version of the report we obtained to exclude information also withheld in court records.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Contra Costa County District Attorney’s Office released a heavily censored version of the report on April 13. That version can be viewed \u003ca href=\"https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/78884/Disclosure-Report-CCCDAO-and-Court-Ordered-Redactions\">here (PDF)\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>The mayor of Antioch is calling for an independent audit of the internal affairs process of the city’s police department, after a judge revealed the names of 17 Antioch police officers who are alleged to have sent racist text messages to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Lamar Thorpe said Saturday afternoon that the audit should include all complaints made against police officers over the last six to eight years. He also called for a complete review of any complaints made that are beyond the statute of limitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The culture at the Antioch Police Department is a problem, and has long been a huge legal and financial liability for the city, which is on full display today,” Thorpe said in a statement. “The culture of the department requires further exploration, including how the hell all of this alleged misconduct could go on for so long without anyone on our command staff noticing, from lieutenant on to chief.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[pullquote size=\"medium\" align=\"right\" citation=\"Antioch Mayor Lamar Thorpe\"]‘At this point, I don’t know how we avoid federal oversight, just given where we are at right now’[/pullquote]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The police officers identified Friday by Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge Clare Maier included the president of the city’s police union. Antioch Police Chief Steven Ford declined to comment on Thorpe’s statements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The texts surfaced as part of an ongoing investigation by the FBI into police officers in Antioch and Pittsburg, for alleged crimes and misconduct including the misuse of police dogs, falsifying education records to obtain pay bumps, and eliciting false confessions. Some of the officers were already known to be under investigation by the FBI, but Friday’s revelation increased the scope of officers known to have participated in racist text message conversations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the East Bay Times, \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/07/judge-names-17-antioch-cops-who-allegedly-sent-racist-text-messages-memes/\">Judge Maier deemed the nature of the text messages to be so offensive that they could provoke more racial hostility\u003c/a>. However, she ruled that the texts should not be kept confidential.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The surfacing of the messages could also affect the outcome of active criminal cases. Evan Kuluk, deputy public defender with the Alternate Defender Office in Contra Costa County, is representing one of four co-defendants charged with homicide in an allegedly gang-related shooting that took place in March of 2021.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Based on Judge Maier’s ruling Friday, we know that the lead investigating detective, as well as the detective who was presented at preliminary hearing as the gang expert, are both involved in sending these texts,” said Kuluk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the officers’ texts were sent in the course of a wiretap operation during which officers listened in on the defendant’s calls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kuluk says that if an officer uses racist language or exhibits racist behavior toward a defendant, “it is pretty much uncontroverted that this would be a violation of the California Racial Justice Act. It seems clear from what we have learned that these text messages will show exactly that racial animus towards the defendants in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/california-legislature-passes-racial-justice-package-affecting-death-penalty-practices\">California Racial Justice Act\u003c/a> — passed in 2020 and expanded in 2022 — prohibits racism in criminal prosecutions and sentencing. If a case is found to involve violations of the act, judges can downgrade criminal charges or dismiss them entirely. According to Kuluk, in his case, “it’s not so much a question of whether the Racial Justice Act has been violated, but what remedy the judge will determine is appropriate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When asked about the prospect of a federal monitor overseeing the Antioch Police Department, Thorpe said, “At this point, I don’t know how we avoid federal oversight, just given where we are at right now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The mayor of Antioch is calling for an independent audit of the internal affairs process of the city’s police department, after a judge revealed the names of 17 Antioch police officers who are alleged to have sent racist text messages to each other.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mayor Lamar Thorpe said Saturday afternoon that the audit should include all complaints made against police officers over the last six to eight years. He also called for a complete review of any complaints made that are beyond the statute of limitations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“The culture at the Antioch Police Department is a problem, and has long been a huge legal and financial liability for the city, which is on full display today,” Thorpe said in a statement. “The culture of the department requires further exploration, including how the hell all of this alleged misconduct could go on for so long without anyone on our command staff noticing, from lieutenant on to chief.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>According to the East Bay Times, \u003ca href=\"https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2023/04/07/judge-names-17-antioch-cops-who-allegedly-sent-racist-text-messages-memes/\">Judge Maier deemed the nature of the text messages to be so offensive that they could provoke more racial hostility\u003c/a>. However, she ruled that the texts should not be kept confidential.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The surfacing of the messages could also affect the outcome of active criminal cases. Evan Kuluk, deputy public defender with the Alternate Defender Office in Contra Costa County, is representing one of four co-defendants charged with homicide in an allegedly gang-related shooting that took place in March of 2021.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Based on Judge Maier’s ruling Friday, we know that the lead investigating detective, as well as the detective who was presented at preliminary hearing as the gang expert, are both involved in sending these texts,” said Kuluk.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the officers’ texts were sent in the course of a wiretap operation during which officers listened in on the defendant’s calls.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kuluk says that if an officer uses racist language or exhibits racist behavior toward a defendant, “it is pretty much uncontroverted that this would be a violation of the California Racial Justice Act. It seems clear from what we have learned that these text messages will show exactly that racial animus towards the defendants in this case.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/california-legislature-passes-racial-justice-package-affecting-death-penalty-practices\">California Racial Justice Act\u003c/a> — passed in 2020 and expanded in 2022 — prohibits racism in criminal prosecutions and sentencing. If a case is found to involve violations of the act, judges can downgrade criminal charges or dismiss them entirely. According to Kuluk, in his case, “it’s not so much a question of whether the Racial Justice Act has been violated, but what remedy the judge will determine is appropriate.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When asked about the prospect of a federal monitor overseeing the Antioch Police Department, Thorpe said, “At this point, I don’t know how we avoid federal oversight, just given where we are at right now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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Help them pay their rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this final episode of the season, we’ll look at the promise, the problems and the history of Section 8, as well as the push for guaranteed income.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC1525875908&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>THE RENT EATS FIRST [TRANSCRIPT]\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN BALDASSARI, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kemanie and his wife were like a lot of young couples just starting out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was the early 2000s. He had recently started his career as a carpenter. She was a teacher. They were both in their mid-20s.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But even with two incomes, they could barely make ends meet. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were living in a, like, a small, tiny little one-bedroom apartment with roaches, like basically a little small ghetto.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Then their son was born. His wife stopped working to take care of him. And their budget got even tighter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And things was hard, but we started falling behind on rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How far behind were you on rent at that time?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I was $4,000 behind on rent at the time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY SOLOMON, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They were living where they both grew up in Marin County, just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At that point in time there was no way for us to survive in Marin County.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It didn’t help that it’s one of the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.california.com/the-most-expensive-counties-in-the-us/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">wealthiest counties in the country\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Or that their landlord was planning on selling the apartment they were renting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They couldn’t figure out how they were going to pay the back rent and still have money for a deposit to move somewhere new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We would have been homeless\u003c/span>. You know, it would have been really bad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They thought about moving in with one of their parents or leaving Marin County altogether. Then, they got some good news. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we got it, we were out doing something — running an errand — and on the way back, my wife got the email.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They got what some have called a “golden ticket” — a Section 8 housing voucher.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Section 8 is a federal program that helps low-income people afford rent on the private market.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kemanie and his wife had put in their application nearly \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">a decade\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> ago. And they’d been stuck on a waiting list that never seemed to budge. When they finally got the news, it was like winning the lottery. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We both looked at each other. And was, like, yes. I mean, it was like perfect timing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It was a huge opportunity for them. With Section 8, they would only have to pay 30% of their income towards rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>KEMANIE\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was an epiphany for us because it was like, life can go on now, like we — there’s a path forward. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They wouldn’t fall behind on bills. And they’d have a chance to catch up. They’d have some room to breathe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: So, they started looking for a new place to live. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we searched and searched and searched, and went and visited and talked to people, and knowing that we had the housing voucher, we thought it was going to be easier because it was a guarantee. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: A guarantee because most of the rent money comes from the federal government. It’s usually deposited straight into the landlord’s bank account.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we found out that it was more of a hindrance than anything. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: It’s what most Section 8 tenants discover — the voucher is not only hard to get, it’s hard to use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> These problems aren’t new. And neither is Section 8. But over the past half century, it’s become the No. 1 way we subsidize rent in this country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As rents climb higher, advocates say we need to fix the problems with Section 8 and expand it. To make it work for more people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. From KQED, this is Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, the final chapter in our series on evictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How to keep people from getting evicted? Help pay the rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908148\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908148\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kemanie holds the keys to his Novato home. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cdiv class=\"mceTemp\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kemanie and his wife have had a housing voucher for nearly two decades now. And anytime they’ve had to move, it’s always the same thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They apply to dozens of places, visit a ton of apartments and get the same answers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And every single time it was like, no, nope, no, no.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It didn’t seem to matter that they had good references from past landlords, even letters from neighbors. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As soon as Section 8 comes up, you see like a glaze go over their eyes like, OK, I got to deal with this conversation and move on to the next person.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Some landlords told them point-blank they wouldn’t accept Section 8, even though that’s illegal in California and a handful of other states. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those laws are hard to enforce, though. And landlords find all sorts of ways of getting around them — like requiring a credit score of 700 or above.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it was kind of, smile in our face, “Oh, yeah, but your credit score is low.” But the bottom line is most people are on Section 8 because they’re having issues financially and their credit is not very good.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Or, landlords would ask them to have an income that’s at least three times the rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s like, if I make three times the monthly amount, I’m buying my own place. P\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">eriod, that’s it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Other times there was an online application, but no box to check to say they had Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Right? And you don’t even get to talk to anybody or even see anybody or state your case. And it doesn’t say you have Section 8 on the app, so you can’t fill that out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Usually, though, they just never heard back. There was no explanation at all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> So, Kemanie and his wife tried harder. They wrote cover letters. And organized all their references and documentation into nice, neat little folders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We would put a little picture, a nice little cute picture of our Black family for people to accept and like and maybe, you know, feel sorry for us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It was frustrating and stressful. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To Kemanie, it felt racist.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it really felt like redlining. Is, that’s how I felt about it, because they’re just like, no, you know.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Racial discrimination can be hard to prove, but a recent audit found it’s a pervasive problem.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California conducted paired tests of white and Black renters. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And found that \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/398920895/raceaudit2016-17?secret_password=A5Sg4qdij47q2erNlj3X#fullscreen&from_embed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nearly 70% of the time\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, landlords in the county where Kemanie lives refused to rent to Black tenants, or used more subtle behaviors, like leaving someone on hold for hours, never calling back or steering Black applicants away from certain neighborhoods. \u003ca href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/504967414/no-and-soi-audit-2019-20-report?secret_password=wY0jrrhNpcBCBhEVm0zi#download&from_embed\">More than half the time\u003c/a>, landlords did the same for voucher holders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> To Kemanie, this was not news. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He and his wife had lived their whole lives in Marin County — a community where more than 70% of the residents are white, and where the average household makes over $115,000 a year. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s hard to explain it to other people. We’re Black in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every day, especially also for me, being a Black man and being very intimidating to a lot of people. Every single day, when I meet somebody, I got to put a smile on my face to like, look, I’m not threatening.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Holding a Section 8 voucher in his hands worsens the daily strain of trying to find acceptance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And it felt like that times 10, because this time we’re looking for everyone’s approval and it’s — we’re trying to dress us up as the best we can to get accepted by people that we know maybe aren’t racist, but just aren’t as inclined to want us to be there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That was very, very, very hard. And that was, I think, probably the most defeating part of the whole thing for us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>MOLLY\u003c/strong>: This discrimination is why we aren’t using Kemanie’s full name. Or his wife’s name.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The experience of looking for a place to live has been so traumatic, they’re afraid to do anything that might hurt their chances of finding a home the next time they have to start looking. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Their struggles with Section 8 highlight two of the program’s biggest failures.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Only \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/94146/trends-in-housing-problems-and-federal-housing-assistance.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">1 in 5\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> who qualify for rental assistance actually receives it. Meaning most people are stuck on waitlists for years — \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/long-waitlists-for-housing-vouchers-show-pressing-unmet-need-for-assistance\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">even decades\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And when people do get off those waitlists, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/publications/pdf/sec8success_1.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">roughly a third\u003c/span>\u003c/a> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lose \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">their vouchers because they can’t find any landlord willing to take them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s partly because there’s an unfair stigma around Section 8, even if it isn’t backed up by evidence. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/eva_rosen?lang=en\">Eva Rosen\u003c/a> is an assistant professor at Georgetown University, and she \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691172569/the-voucher-promise\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">wrote a book on Section 8\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA ROSEN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Landlords sometimes don’t want to rent to big families. They often worry that voucher-holders might be more likely to do damage to the home \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">or that they might be noisier tenants. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And again, none of this is really backed up by any kind of data, but the stigma itself is very real.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This unfair stigma is made worse when you add in racism — the kind that Kemanie and his family felt. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nationally, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/assthsg.html#2009-2021_query\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">about two-thirds of voucher holders\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> are people of color.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In my research with landlords, they say things like, well, I couldn’t rent to a Black person in this neighborhood because all of my other tenants are white and they would not like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think racism is a big part of the reticence that we see from landlords.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Despite all these barriers, Kemanie and his family \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">were \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">able to find a place to live. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’ve been at their current home for three and a half years now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And in the world of Section 8, it’s kind of a unicorn. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s a single-family home on a quiet cul-de-sac in Novato, a wealthy suburb north of San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is literally everything we could ask for. This is — we’re so incredibly happy here right now in the place that we have. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: It’s got three bedrooms, a two-car garage, and a big, tree-lined backyard.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There are parks nearby and great schools for their kids. And, they feel safe here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Safety at school, safety coming home from school, you know, safety on the weekends, playing with their friends, you know, all of that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Only \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/where-families-with-children-use-housing-vouchers\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">14% of voucher holders\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> live in affluent neighborhoods like this. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kemanie and his wife know just how rare it is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s like we’re living in a dream that we know are about to wake up from. We know at some point someone’s going to shake us and be like, “Hey, wake up.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That wake-up call could come in just a few months.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Their landlord told them they’re thinking about selling. And their current lease lasts only until September. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After that, there are no guarantees.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s all up in the air. Everything’s very unsettled for us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When that time comes, they’ll have to find another landlord willing to take them. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They know from experience it won’t be easy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To make the system better for tenants, we need to get more landlords on board. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ll tell you how, coming up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908149\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908149\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A ‘Welcome’ sign hangs by the door to the home Kemanie shares with his family in Novato. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: When the Pruitt-Igoe public housing development in St. Louis, Missouri, opened in 1954, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_zFIg8N9Rw\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">it was celebrated\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> as a marvel of modern architecture: 33 towers, each 11 stories tall. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_zFIg8N9Rw\">\u003cb>\u003cem>COMMERCIAL FOR PRUITT-IGOE HOUSING DEVELOPMENT\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> With indoor plumbing, electric lights, fresh-plastered walls and the rest of the conveniences that are expected in the 20th century. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But just a decade later, it was falling apart and had become a symbol of government mismanagement and neglect, drawing national attention for its horrible living conditions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Take \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-cfjqh1sSY&t=23s\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">this newscast\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, from 1968: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-cfjqh1sSY&t=23s\">\u003cb>\u003cem>KMOX NEWS REPORT\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When the temperatures dropped below freezing this week, water lines in several of the Pruitt-Igoe apartment buildings broke and the subsequent flow of water turned into ice. At 2311 Dixon, a sewer line is broken, and now raw sewage bubbles out of the ground like a malevolent spring. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: On \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.greyscape.com/modernism-was-framed-the-truth-about-pruitt-igoe/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">March 16, 1972\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, the first of its 33 towers was demolished. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Sounds: A building is being demolished; Pruitt-Igoe implodes.)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=738WpY2_JV8\">\u003cb>PRUITT-IGOE IMPLOSION\u003c/b>\u003c/a>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Not only St. Louis, but the rest of the nation is viewing with great interest the results of this experiment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> President Richard Nixon saw the growing frustration with public housing failures like Pruitt-Igoe. And so he took a turn towards the private market instead. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Two years after that demolition, Nixon introduced Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Again, here’s Georgetown University professor Eva Rosen.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’re not having to build public housing, you’re not having to maintain or renovate a public housing stock. And so it is this sort of very, in theory, economically efficient tool.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Under Nixon, Section 8 was just a pilot program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But by the 1990s, the stage was set for it to grow. Public housing had gotten a real bad rap, and that’s when President Bill Clinton really ramped up Section 8.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Today I had the honor of signing the budget for programs to help the homeless to give housing vouchers to empower the poor.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> His administration changed the name from Section 8 to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/phr/about\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Housing Choice Vouchers\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And actually in the title, you can very much notice this emphasis on choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: Eva says that reflects one of the goals for the program. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hope was that people could use their vouchers to move to more affluent neighborhoods. Neighborhoods with more resources, better schools and more jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: Public housing had become extremely segregated. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">By 1989, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal//Publications/pdf/HUD-5961.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nearly 70% of the households \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">of the residents were people of color. Mostly women-led, Black and Latinx households.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And most of the housing developments were also in segregated and impoverished neighborhoods. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that was causing all kinds of problems. And it was leaving public housing residents with very little choice about where they ended up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Eva says the program hasn’t lived up to its promise of giving voucher holders a real choice of where to live. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of that comes down to landlords: when \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">they \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">choose to participate, and why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we introduced these private landlords into this system, we sort of just assumed that they would play along, that they would want to participate. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that tends not always to be the case.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">some \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">landlords, Section 8 works really well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eugene Zinchik and his brother own a real estate and property management company in San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he’s been renting to voucher holders for about six or seven years now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b> \u003cstrong>ZINCHIK\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s more stability in knowing that your rent checks are going to be coming, you know, whatever it is that happens. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">During the pandemic, most of Eugene’s Section 8 tenants stayed put, and their rent checks kept flowing in. But a lot of his tenants who didn’t have vouchers — they left.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even without the coronavirus, Eugene says voucher holders just stick around longer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s less turnover for a landlord. If there’s less turnover, there’s no rent that they’re losing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: But Eugene says the\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> real \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">benefit\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> to landlords \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/Urban-Landlords-HCV-Program.pdf\">depends a lot on where the property is\u003c/a>.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He points to a new building he’s managing in San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood. Even though he hasn’t found a tenant yet, Eugene already knows it’ll be someone on Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Part of San Francisco is extremely, extremely expensive. Bayview is still semi-affordable for maybe, still, for a blue-collar family. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: He says r\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">ents here are about $1,000 lower than in other parts of the city. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But landlords can actually \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/mdesmond/files/desmondperkins.cc_.2016.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">charge a Section 8 \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> than they would with someone without a voucher.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s because when the government decides how much it’s willing to pay for each voucher, it doesn’t vary the amounts by neighborhood. It sets one standard for the whole city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s a pretty good deal for landlords in places like Bayview.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So in Bayview, in my experience, the amounts that Section 8 pays are pretty much competitive.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But landlords in high-rent places could actually \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lose \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In at least half the neighborhoods in San Francisco, Section 8 what they pay per unit is just not compatible with the market rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: Eva says those incentives have created an unintended consequence: Most Section 8 tenants are trapped in low-income neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And this is where you start to understand how the program, which was designed and very much hoped to provide tenants choice, actually creates sort of an opposite scenario where they’re being pushed away from the kind of neighborhoods that they might want to end up in and forced into neighborhoods that they don’t necessarily want to be in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Eugene says even when landlords \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">want \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">to rent to a voucher holder, it’s not that easy. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You have to jump through a lot of hoops. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What kind of hoops? Well, let’s take a look.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">First, there are the forms. For both tenants and landlords. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, forms could be scary if you’ve never seen this form before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Let’s say you do fill them out correctly. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> For about two weeks, you probably hear nothing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then, hopefully, you get a call for an inspection. The housing authority needs to make sure these buildings are up to code. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For that, you’ll need to take the day off work. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of times you get a four-hour window for the inspector to come in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And if you have any questions, don’t try to get anyone on the phone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just talking to somebody, you’d be waiting on hold for an hour.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eugene says it’s like dealing with the DMV.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we’ve all been there, but you know, we don’t really want to do that unless we have to.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development held \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/PIH/documents/ListeningForumsPublicSummary012320.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">listening sessions\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> with property owners across the country back in 2018. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most of the sessions were taken up by complaints. Eighty-two\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> percent said they had bad experiences dealing with their local housing authority. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">One of their biggest issues: how long it takes to sign up a new tenant. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The whole process can take a month or two — time spent without collecting rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a landlord to just sit and wait for that tenant is not, is not reasonable, especially if it’s an individual like a mom-and-pop type of shop.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So how do we improve Section 8? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For tenants to have more choice — you know, the original goal of the program — you need more landlords with properties in more neighborhoods. Here’s Eva Rosen: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we think about landlord participation, I think we need to think about carrots and sticks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That means tougher laws to prevent landlords from discriminating against Section 8 tenants. And better enforcement. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s sort of like a stick, right? It’s a slap on the wrist. It’s a no, you’re not allowed to do this.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, then there’s the carrot: more voucher money for properties in wealthier neighborhoods. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s something the federal government is already trying. They’re basing the rent on the ZIP code, instead of one standard for the whole city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because there’s no way a landlord is going to participate in the program if they’re getting less rent than they would get from a market tenant, right?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">An early test of the program \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/SAFMR-Interim-Report.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">showed it worked\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. More landlords in affluent areas opened their doors to Section 8.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But in a few cities, there was a downside, too. Some landlords in low-income neighborhoods stopped renting to voucher holders. That led to a drop in the number of homes available there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, the results were still promising enough that they’ve expanded it to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/a-guide-to-small-area-fair-market-rents-safmrs\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">two dozen cities\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> across the country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908157\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908157\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eugene Zinchik poses inside a property he manages in San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood. \u003ccite>(Erin Baldassari/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Another way to recruit more landlords? Cut the red tape. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Give those individuals that have the voucher more say of what they’re able to do. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Give the power to that individual to sign on their own behalf to take the place or not take the place.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After all, Section 8 was supposed to be about choice. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, Eugene says, let people make their own. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: A different solution that \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">is \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">all about choice. And cold, hard cash. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When the coronavirus hit — and the economy shut down — one thing was clear: People needed cash. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the federal government stepped in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzMNV2qH2IA\">\u003cb>WCNC\u003c/b>\u003c/a>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Stimulus checks are rolling in for millions of Americans today. About 80 million people are expected to receive their payments today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhyfKmBfRi8\">\u003cem>\u003cb>NBC\u003c/b>\u003c/em>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, these direct payments are what everyone is talking about because 90% of American households should be getting some money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Before the pandemic, the idea of giving out free money in this country was kind of a hard sell. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/nataliefoster?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Natalie Foster\u003c/a> is the president and co-founder of the Economic Security Project. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE FOSTER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then the pandemic hit and it became clear that cash was the currency of urgency.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it wasn’t just stimulus checks. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pandemic unemployment insurance was important for supporting people in the midst of job loss, expanding tax credits like the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These were all things that the government did.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a lot of families, that extra money was a lifeline. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Despite a recession and a global pandemic, poverty in this country actually \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">decreased\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We saw a decrease in poverty, and that is because the government realized that poverty is a policy choice and we could make different choices. And so the politics of the moment allowed for us to make a different choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We also made a choice to keep more people housed, with eviction moratoriums and rent relief. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For progressives and others, those pandemic-era programs were a golden opportunity t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">o tackle poverty and housing insecurity on a grand scale. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And test an idea that’s been gaining steam over the past couple years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>NEWS CLIPS\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: It’s an idea known as guaranteed basic income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A monthly, no-strings-attached cash payment given directly to individuals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A guaranteed income. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Basically, if you want to solve poverty, give people money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Here’s how it would work: The money would come from the federal government, ideally in the form of a regular, monthly payment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The amount wouldn’t make you rich, but it could help pay for your housing, your food or whatever else you need. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: F\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">or all the excitement around guaranteed income today, it’s not actually a new idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thomas Paine argued for it way back in the 18th century. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And over the years, its supporters have come from all over the political spectrum.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From the Black Panthers, to President Richard Nixon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>RECORDING OF PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON DISCUSSING GUARANTEED INCOME\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What I am proposing is that the federal government build a foundation under the income of every American family with dependent children that cannot care for itself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From libertarian economist Milton Friedman to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It seems to me that the civil rights movement must now begin to organize for the guaranteed annual income, begin to organize people all over our country and mobilize forces, so that we can bring to the attention of our nation, this need and this something which I believe will go a long, long way toward dealing with the Negros’ economic problem and the economic problem with many other poor people confronting our nation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Alaska’s been doing this \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://pfd.alaska.gov/Division-Info/historical-timeline\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">since the 1980s\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, paying out oil dividends to all its residents — on average, about $1,600 a year. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But more recently, about 90 guaranteed-income experiments have popped up across the country. Most were inspired by one city: Stockton, California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL TUBBS\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hello, my name is \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MichaelDTubbs?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Michael Tubbs\u003c/a>. I am the former mayor of the city of Stockton, California. I’m the founder of \u003ca href=\"https://www.mayorsforagi.org/\">Mayors for a Guaranteed Income\u003c/a> and of \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2022/02/former-stockton-mayor-launches-nonprofit-to-end-poverty-in-california/\">End Poverty in California.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael led Stockton’s guaranteed-income program back in 2019. He says a lot of the issues that came across his desk all came back to the same thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Issues of poverty and lack and pervasive poverty and generational poverty.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Stockton was the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/jul/28/subprimecrisis.useconomy\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">foreclosure capital\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of the country during the Great Recession. It \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.reuters.com/article/us-stockton-bankruptcy/stockton-california-files-for-bankruptcy-idUSBRE85S05120120629\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">declared bankruptcy\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> in 2012. And today, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/about-seed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">about a quarter\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of its population lives below the poverty line. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael wanted to bring a guaranteed income to Stockton because the old way of addressing poverty wasn’t working. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The programs we have now — like welfare or food stamps or housing vouchers — they have a lot of rules and regulations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882364\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882364\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-800x533.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-800x533.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-1020x680.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-160x107.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-1536x1024.jpeg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut.jpeg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michael Tubbs, former mayor of Stockton, is seen at his office in Stockton on Feb. 7, 2020. As mayor, with the help of the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, he implemented an 18-month trial of universal basic income for 125 residents of his city. The concept has recently been gaining ground. \u003ccite>(Nick Otto/AFP via Getty Images))\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you’re on welfare, you have to spend so much time being with case managers, filling out forms, doing this, doing that, which robs you of the ability to do all the other things you need to do. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Guaranteed-income programs don’t require all that micromanagement, which frees up people’s time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And, they have another benefit: You can spend the money however you need. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Whether it’s on new tires, a transmission, a new washer and dryer, school clothes, a wedding, going to visit your parents you haven’t seen in a while.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When people in Stockton were given the choice of how to use the $500 they got each month, they tended to spend it on food and other essentials.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some also used it to help pay for housing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were able to sort of save up for a down payment to move to safer living conditions. Or some people use it to cope with sort of small rises in rent that occur: $50 here or $100 here, $125 here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Researchers in Stockton didn’t look specifically at the impact of a guaranteed income on evictions. But the small stipend could help. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/12/upshot/eviction-prevention-solutions-government.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most people get evicted for $600 or less\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, according to a New York Times analysis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just knowing you have enough money to get to the end of the month also goes a long way for your mental health.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Folks who received the guaranteed income went from elevated levels of stress to regular levels of stress. And that just was like, wow, like money really sort of affects health and mental health and well-being and how we show up in the world. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But probably one of the biggest findings from Stockton: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It challenged a widely held criticism of guaranteed income, that it would cause people to stop working. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The money actually had the opposite effect. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/employment\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People worked \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">About \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/employment\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">12% went from part-time to full-time work\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. That’s more than double the control group. And participants were less likely to be unemployed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I wasn’t surprised, but I’m glad the data validated this belief that that $500 was not going to make anyone stop working, that people still worked.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael says that’s because it wasn’t enough to live on. But it gave people some breathing room. It allowed them to quit one of their part-time jobs and look for full-time work.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Or go back to school to change careers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It allowed people the chance to live. And live a life, and live a life beyond just going through the motions and working and going to sleep and working, going to sleep. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, critics say you shouldn’t draw too many conclusions from one small pilot program — with only 125 participants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rolling out a guaranteed income nationally could have a much bigger impact on the economy. And many worry that all that extra cash would only cause prices to rise, setting off higher inflation. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guaranteed income also does nothing to solve a larger problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The thing we \u003ca href=\"https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cesan.nr0.htm#:~:text=%2D%2DHousing%20expenditures%20increased%203.5,dwellings%20were%20down%200.5%20percent.\">spend the most money on is housing\u003c/a>. And that just keeps going up. Taking a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/10/home-prices-are-now-rising-much-faster-than-incomes-studies-show.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">bigger and bigger piece\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> out of our paychecks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guaranteed income is great, but we don’t want all that money to be spent on housing because people have other needs, right? So I think a guaranteed income is a powerful tool. But like any toolbox, you need more than one tool to really get the job done. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Guaranteed income can’t solve poverty on its own. But Michael says it’s a good place to start if we want to solve other big problems, like evictions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Evictions perpetuate inequality, a\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nd they push more people into poverty. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When you’re evicted, you lose your neighborhood, your school, your support network. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can be trapped in a cycle of debt, even become homeless. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But the solutions are within our reach, and people are already pushing for them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Activists in Fresno are fighting for a fair shot in court. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tenants in Antioch are demanding more protection against rising rents. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And women like \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11905386/why-black-women-are-more-likely-to-face-eviction\">Jean [Kendrick, from Episode 2]\u003c/a> are sharing their stories and calling attention to inequities we can’t unsee. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Evictions reflect our housing system: who reaps the profit and who suffers the pain.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But we have an opportunity to make the system more fair, to invest in people’s success, not just for a few, but for all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The question is, will we take it? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Molly Solomon. Thank you so much for listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you like what you hear, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts — and share it with a friend!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We’ve got one more thing that we’re working on. It’s a bonus episode full of stories from you. That’ll drop in a few weeks, so stay tuned. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sold Out is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us: Molly Solomon and Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. And Rob Speight wrote our theme song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Thank you to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you for listening! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Let us know what you think of the show by \u003ca href=\"https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/6755022/f959eb5782fc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">taking a quick survey\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "To many renters, a Section 8 housing voucher is seen as a \"golden ticket,\" a federal subsidy that ensures only 30% of their income goes to rent. But actually using it is a struggle. We talk to renters and landlords about why.",
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"description": "To many renters, a Section 8 housing voucher is seen as a "golden ticket," a federal subsidy that ensures only 30% of their income goes to rent. But actually using it is a struggle. We talk to renters and landlords about why.",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Falling behind on rent is the primary reason that people are evicted. So how do you keep people from falling behind in the first place? Help them pay their rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this final episode of the season, we’ll look at the promise, the problems and the history of Section 8, as well as the push for guaranteed income.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC1525875908&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>THE RENT EATS FIRST [TRANSCRIPT]\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN BALDASSARI, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kemanie and his wife were like a lot of young couples just starting out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was the early 2000s. He had recently started his career as a carpenter. She was a teacher. They were both in their mid-20s.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But even with two incomes, they could barely make ends meet. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were living in a, like, a small, tiny little one-bedroom apartment with roaches, like basically a little small ghetto.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Then their son was born. His wife stopped working to take care of him. And their budget got even tighter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And things was hard, but we started falling behind on rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How far behind were you on rent at that time?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I was $4,000 behind on rent at the time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY SOLOMON, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They were living where they both grew up in Marin County, just across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At that point in time there was no way for us to survive in Marin County.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It didn’t help that it’s one of the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.california.com/the-most-expensive-counties-in-the-us/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">wealthiest counties in the country\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Or that their landlord was planning on selling the apartment they were renting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They couldn’t figure out how they were going to pay the back rent and still have money for a deposit to move somewhere new.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We would have been homeless\u003c/span>. You know, it would have been really bad.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They thought about moving in with one of their parents or leaving Marin County altogether. Then, they got some good news. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we got it, we were out doing something — running an errand — and on the way back, my wife got the email.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They got what some have called a “golden ticket” — a Section 8 housing voucher.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Section 8 is a federal program that helps low-income people afford rent on the private market.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kemanie and his wife had put in their application nearly \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">a decade\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> ago. And they’d been stuck on a waiting list that never seemed to budge. When they finally got the news, it was like winning the lottery. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We both looked at each other. And was, like, yes. I mean, it was like perfect timing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It was a huge opportunity for them. With Section 8, they would only have to pay 30% of their income towards rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>KEMANIE\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was an epiphany for us because it was like, life can go on now, like we — there’s a path forward. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They wouldn’t fall behind on bills. And they’d have a chance to catch up. They’d have some room to breathe. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: So, they started looking for a new place to live. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we searched and searched and searched, and went and visited and talked to people, and knowing that we had the housing voucher, we thought it was going to be easier because it was a guarantee. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: A guarantee because most of the rent money comes from the federal government. It’s usually deposited straight into the landlord’s bank account.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we found out that it was more of a hindrance than anything. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: It’s what most Section 8 tenants discover — the voucher is not only hard to get, it’s hard to use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> These problems aren’t new. And neither is Section 8. But over the past half century, it’s become the No. 1 way we subsidize rent in this country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As rents climb higher, advocates say we need to fix the problems with Section 8 and expand it. To make it work for more people.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. From KQED, this is Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Today, the final chapter in our series on evictions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>How to keep people from getting evicted? Help pay the rent.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908148\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908148\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54286_009_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kemanie holds the keys to his Novato home. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cdiv class=\"mceTemp\">\u003c/div>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kemanie and his wife have had a housing voucher for nearly two decades now. And anytime they’ve had to move, it’s always the same thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They apply to dozens of places, visit a ton of apartments and get the same answers.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And every single time it was like, no, nope, no, no.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It didn’t seem to matter that they had good references from past landlords, even letters from neighbors. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As soon as Section 8 comes up, you see like a glaze go over their eyes like, OK, I got to deal with this conversation and move on to the next person.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Some landlords told them point-blank they wouldn’t accept Section 8, even though that’s illegal in California and a handful of other states. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those laws are hard to enforce, though. And landlords find all sorts of ways of getting around them — like requiring a credit score of 700 or above.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it was kind of, smile in our face, “Oh, yeah, but your credit score is low.” But the bottom line is most people are on Section 8 because they’re having issues financially and their credit is not very good.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Or, landlords would ask them to have an income that’s at least three times the rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s like, if I make three times the monthly amount, I’m buying my own place. P\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">eriod, that’s it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Other times there was an online application, but no box to check to say they had Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Right? And you don’t even get to talk to anybody or even see anybody or state your case. And it doesn’t say you have Section 8 on the app, so you can’t fill that out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Usually, though, they just never heard back. There was no explanation at all.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> So, Kemanie and his wife tried harder. They wrote cover letters. And organized all their references and documentation into nice, neat little folders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We would put a little picture, a nice little cute picture of our Black family for people to accept and like and maybe, you know, feel sorry for us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It was frustrating and stressful. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To Kemanie, it felt racist.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it really felt like redlining. Is, that’s how I felt about it, because they’re just like, no, you know.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Racial discrimination can be hard to prove, but a recent audit found it’s a pervasive problem.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The Fair Housing Advocates of Northern California conducted paired tests of white and Black renters. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And found that \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/398920895/raceaudit2016-17?secret_password=A5Sg4qdij47q2erNlj3X#fullscreen&from_embed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nearly 70% of the time\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, landlords in the county where Kemanie lives refused to rent to Black tenants, or used more subtle behaviors, like leaving someone on hold for hours, never calling back or steering Black applicants away from certain neighborhoods. \u003ca href=\"https://www.scribd.com/document/504967414/no-and-soi-audit-2019-20-report?secret_password=wY0jrrhNpcBCBhEVm0zi#download&from_embed\">More than half the time\u003c/a>, landlords did the same for voucher holders.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> To Kemanie, this was not news. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He and his wife had lived their whole lives in Marin County — a community where more than 70% of the residents are white, and where the average household makes over $115,000 a year. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s hard to explain it to other people. We’re Black in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Every day, especially also for me, being a Black man and being very intimidating to a lot of people. Every single day, when I meet somebody, I got to put a smile on my face to like, look, I’m not threatening.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Holding a Section 8 voucher in his hands worsens the daily strain of trying to find acceptance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And it felt like that times 10, because this time we’re looking for everyone’s approval and it’s — we’re trying to dress us up as the best we can to get accepted by people that we know maybe aren’t racist, but just aren’t as inclined to want us to be there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That was very, very, very hard. And that was, I think, probably the most defeating part of the whole thing for us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>MOLLY\u003c/strong>: This discrimination is why we aren’t using Kemanie’s full name. Or his wife’s name.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The experience of looking for a place to live has been so traumatic, they’re afraid to do anything that might hurt their chances of finding a home the next time they have to start looking. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Their struggles with Section 8 highlight two of the program’s biggest failures.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Only \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/94146/trends-in-housing-problems-and-federal-housing-assistance.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">1 in 5\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> who qualify for rental assistance actually receives it. Meaning most people are stuck on waitlists for years — \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/long-waitlists-for-housing-vouchers-show-pressing-unmet-need-for-assistance\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">even decades\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And when people do get off those waitlists, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/publications/pdf/sec8success_1.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">roughly a third\u003c/span>\u003c/a> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lose \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">their vouchers because they can’t find any landlord willing to take them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s partly because there’s an unfair stigma around Section 8, even if it isn’t backed up by evidence. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/eva_rosen?lang=en\">Eva Rosen\u003c/a> is an assistant professor at Georgetown University, and she \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691172569/the-voucher-promise\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">wrote a book on Section 8\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA ROSEN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Landlords sometimes don’t want to rent to big families. They often worry that voucher-holders might be more likely to do damage to the home \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">or that they might be noisier tenants. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And again, none of this is really backed up by any kind of data, but the stigma itself is very real.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This unfair stigma is made worse when you add in racism — the kind that Kemanie and his family felt. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nationally, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/assthsg.html#2009-2021_query\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">about two-thirds of voucher holders\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> are people of color.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In my research with landlords, they say things like, well, I couldn’t rent to a Black person in this neighborhood because all of my other tenants are white and they would not like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think racism is a big part of the reticence that we see from landlords.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Despite all these barriers, Kemanie and his family \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">were \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">able to find a place to live. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’ve been at their current home for three and a half years now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And in the world of Section 8, it’s kind of a unicorn. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s a single-family home on a quiet cul-de-sac in Novato, a wealthy suburb north of San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is literally everything we could ask for. This is — we’re so incredibly happy here right now in the place that we have. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: It’s got three bedrooms, a two-car garage, and a big, tree-lined backyard.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There are parks nearby and great schools for their kids. And, they feel safe here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Safety at school, safety coming home from school, you know, safety on the weekends, playing with their friends, you know, all of that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Only \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/where-families-with-children-use-housing-vouchers\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">14% of voucher holders\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> live in affluent neighborhoods like this. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kemanie and his wife know just how rare it is. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s like we’re living in a dream that we know are about to wake up from. We know at some point someone’s going to shake us and be like, “Hey, wake up.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That wake-up call could come in just a few months.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Their landlord told them they’re thinking about selling. And their current lease lasts only until September. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After that, there are no guarantees.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEMANIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s all up in the air. Everything’s very unsettled for us. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When that time comes, they’ll have to find another landlord willing to take them. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They know from experience it won’t be easy. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To make the system better for tenants, we need to get more landlords on board. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ll tell you how, coming up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908149\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908149\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/RS54283_006_KQED_Kemanie_03112022-qut.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A ‘Welcome’ sign hangs by the door to the home Kemanie shares with his family in Novato. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: When the Pruitt-Igoe public housing development in St. Louis, Missouri, opened in 1954, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_zFIg8N9Rw\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">it was celebrated\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> as a marvel of modern architecture: 33 towers, each 11 stories tall. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_zFIg8N9Rw\">\u003cb>\u003cem>COMMERCIAL FOR PRUITT-IGOE HOUSING DEVELOPMENT\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> With indoor plumbing, electric lights, fresh-plastered walls and the rest of the conveniences that are expected in the 20th century. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But just a decade later, it was falling apart and had become a symbol of government mismanagement and neglect, drawing national attention for its horrible living conditions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Take \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-cfjqh1sSY&t=23s\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">this newscast\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, from 1968: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-cfjqh1sSY&t=23s\">\u003cb>\u003cem>KMOX NEWS REPORT\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When the temperatures dropped below freezing this week, water lines in several of the Pruitt-Igoe apartment buildings broke and the subsequent flow of water turned into ice. At 2311 Dixon, a sewer line is broken, and now raw sewage bubbles out of the ground like a malevolent spring. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: On \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.greyscape.com/modernism-was-framed-the-truth-about-pruitt-igoe/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">March 16, 1972\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, the first of its 33 towers was demolished. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Sounds: A building is being demolished; Pruitt-Igoe implodes.)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=738WpY2_JV8\">\u003cb>PRUITT-IGOE IMPLOSION\u003c/b>\u003c/a>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Not only St. Louis, but the rest of the nation is viewing with great interest the results of this experiment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> President Richard Nixon saw the growing frustration with public housing failures like Pruitt-Igoe. And so he took a turn towards the private market instead. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Two years after that demolition, Nixon introduced Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Again, here’s Georgetown University professor Eva Rosen.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You’re not having to build public housing, you’re not having to maintain or renovate a public housing stock. And so it is this sort of very, in theory, economically efficient tool.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Under Nixon, Section 8 was just a pilot program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But by the 1990s, the stage was set for it to grow. Public housing had gotten a real bad rap, and that’s when President Bill Clinton really ramped up Section 8.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Today I had the honor of signing the budget for programs to help the homeless to give housing vouchers to empower the poor.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> His administration changed the name from Section 8 to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/phr/about\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Housing Choice Vouchers\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And actually in the title, you can very much notice this emphasis on choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: Eva says that reflects one of the goals for the program. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The hope was that people could use their vouchers to move to more affluent neighborhoods. Neighborhoods with more resources, better schools and more jobs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: Public housing had become extremely segregated. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">By 1989, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal//Publications/pdf/HUD-5961.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nearly 70% of the households \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">of the residents were people of color. Mostly women-led, Black and Latinx households.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And most of the housing developments were also in segregated and impoverished neighborhoods. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that was causing all kinds of problems. And it was leaving public housing residents with very little choice about where they ended up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Eva says the program hasn’t lived up to its promise of giving voucher holders a real choice of where to live. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of that comes down to landlords: when \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">they \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">choose to participate, and why.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we introduced these private landlords into this system, we sort of just assumed that they would play along, that they would want to participate. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that tends not always to be the case.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">some \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">landlords, Section 8 works really well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eugene Zinchik and his brother own a real estate and property management company in San Francisco. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And he’s been renting to voucher holders for about six or seven years now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b> \u003cstrong>ZINCHIK\u003c/strong>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s more stability in knowing that your rent checks are going to be coming, you know, whatever it is that happens. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">During the pandemic, most of Eugene’s Section 8 tenants stayed put, and their rent checks kept flowing in. But a lot of his tenants who didn’t have vouchers — they left.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Even without the coronavirus, Eugene says voucher holders just stick around longer. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s less turnover for a landlord. If there’s less turnover, there’s no rent that they’re losing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: But Eugene says the\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> real \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">benefit\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> to landlords \u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/Urban-Landlords-HCV-Program.pdf\">depends a lot on where the property is\u003c/a>.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He points to a new building he’s managing in San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood. Even though he hasn’t found a tenant yet, Eugene already knows it’ll be someone on Section 8. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Part of San Francisco is extremely, extremely expensive. Bayview is still semi-affordable for maybe, still, for a blue-collar family. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: He says r\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">ents here are about $1,000 lower than in other parts of the city. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But landlords can actually \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/mdesmond/files/desmondperkins.cc_.2016.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">charge a Section 8 \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> than they would with someone without a voucher.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s because when the government decides how much it’s willing to pay for each voucher, it doesn’t vary the amounts by neighborhood. It sets one standard for the whole city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So it’s a pretty good deal for landlords in places like Bayview.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So in Bayview, in my experience, the amounts that Section 8 pays are pretty much competitive.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But landlords in high-rent places could actually \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">lose \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In at least half the neighborhoods in San Francisco, Section 8 what they pay per unit is just not compatible with the market rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>ERIN\u003c/strong>: Eva says those incentives have created an unintended consequence: Most Section 8 tenants are trapped in low-income neighborhoods.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And this is where you start to understand how the program, which was designed and very much hoped to provide tenants choice, actually creates sort of an opposite scenario where they’re being pushed away from the kind of neighborhoods that they might want to end up in and forced into neighborhoods that they don’t necessarily want to be in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Eugene says even when landlords \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">want \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">to rent to a voucher holder, it’s not that easy. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You have to jump through a lot of hoops. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What kind of hoops? Well, let’s take a look.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">First, there are the forms. For both tenants and landlords. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, forms could be scary if you’ve never seen this form before.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Let’s say you do fill them out correctly. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> For about two weeks, you probably hear nothing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then, hopefully, you get a call for an inspection. The housing authority needs to make sure these buildings are up to code. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For that, you’ll need to take the day off work. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of times you get a four-hour window for the inspector to come in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And if you have any questions, don’t try to get anyone on the phone. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just talking to somebody, you’d be waiting on hold for an hour.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Eugene says it’s like dealing with the DMV.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we’ve all been there, but you know, we don’t really want to do that unless we have to.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development held \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/PIH/documents/ListeningForumsPublicSummary012320.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">listening sessions\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> with property owners across the country back in 2018. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most of the sessions were taken up by complaints. Eighty-two\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> percent said they had bad experiences dealing with their local housing authority. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">One of their biggest issues: how long it takes to sign up a new tenant. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The whole process can take a month or two — time spent without collecting rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a landlord to just sit and wait for that tenant is not, is not reasonable, especially if it’s an individual like a mom-and-pop type of shop.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So how do we improve Section 8? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For tenants to have more choice — you know, the original goal of the program — you need more landlords with properties in more neighborhoods. Here’s Eva Rosen: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When we think about landlord participation, I think we need to think about carrots and sticks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That means tougher laws to prevent landlords from discriminating against Section 8 tenants. And better enforcement. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s sort of like a stick, right? It’s a slap on the wrist. It’s a no, you’re not allowed to do this.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, then there’s the carrot: more voucher money for properties in wealthier neighborhoods. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s something the federal government is already trying. They’re basing the rent on the ZIP code, instead of one standard for the whole city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EVA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because there’s no way a landlord is going to participate in the program if they’re getting less rent than they would get from a market tenant, right?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">An early test of the program \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/SAFMR-Interim-Report.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">showed it worked\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. More landlords in affluent areas opened their doors to Section 8.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But in a few cities, there was a downside, too. Some landlords in low-income neighborhoods stopped renting to voucher holders. That led to a drop in the number of homes available there. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, the results were still promising enough that they’ve expanded it to \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cbpp.org/research/housing/a-guide-to-small-area-fair-market-rents-safmrs\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">two dozen cities\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> across the country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11908157\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11908157\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/03/IMG_9801-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Eugene Zinchik poses inside a property he manages in San Francisco’s Bayview neighborhood. \u003ccite>(Erin Baldassari/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Another way to recruit more landlords? Cut the red tape. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>EUGENE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Give those individuals that have the voucher more say of what they’re able to do. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Give the power to that individual to sign on their own behalf to take the place or not take the place.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After all, Section 8 was supposed to be about choice. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, Eugene says, let people make their own. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: A different solution that \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">is \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">all about choice. And cold, hard cash. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When the coronavirus hit — and the economy shut down — one thing was clear: People needed cash. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the federal government stepped in. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzMNV2qH2IA\">\u003cb>WCNC\u003c/b>\u003c/a>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Stimulus checks are rolling in for millions of Americans today. About 80 million people are expected to receive their payments today.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhyfKmBfRi8\">\u003cem>\u003cb>NBC\u003c/b>\u003c/em>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, these direct payments are what everyone is talking about because 90% of American households should be getting some money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Before the pandemic, the idea of giving out free money in this country was kind of a hard sell. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/nataliefoster?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Natalie Foster\u003c/a> is the president and co-founder of the Economic Security Project. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE FOSTER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then the pandemic hit and it became clear that cash was the currency of urgency.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it wasn’t just stimulus checks. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pandemic unemployment insurance was important for supporting people in the midst of job loss, expanding tax credits like the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These were all things that the government did.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a lot of families, that extra money was a lifeline. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Despite a recession and a global pandemic, poverty in this country actually \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">decreased\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATALIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We saw a decrease in poverty, and that is because the government realized that poverty is a policy choice and we could make different choices. And so the politics of the moment allowed for us to make a different choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We also made a choice to keep more people housed, with eviction moratoriums and rent relief. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For progressives and others, those pandemic-era programs were a golden opportunity t\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">o tackle poverty and housing insecurity on a grand scale. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And test an idea that’s been gaining steam over the past couple years. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>NEWS CLIPS\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: It’s an idea known as guaranteed basic income.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A monthly, no-strings-attached cash payment given directly to individuals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A guaranteed income. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Basically, if you want to solve poverty, give people money. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Here’s how it would work: The money would come from the federal government, ideally in the form of a regular, monthly payment.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The amount wouldn’t make you rich, but it could help pay for your housing, your food or whatever else you need. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: F\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">or all the excitement around guaranteed income today, it’s not actually a new idea. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thomas Paine argued for it way back in the 18th century. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And over the years, its supporters have come from all over the political spectrum.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From the Black Panthers, to President Richard Nixon. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>RECORDING OF PRESIDENT RICHARD NIXON DISCUSSING GUARANTEED INCOME\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">What I am proposing is that the federal government build a foundation under the income of every American family with dependent children that cannot care for itself.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From libertarian economist Milton Friedman to civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It seems to me that the civil rights movement must now begin to organize for the guaranteed annual income, begin to organize people all over our country and mobilize forces, so that we can bring to the attention of our nation, this need and this something which I believe will go a long, long way toward dealing with the Negros’ economic problem and the economic problem with many other poor people confronting our nation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Alaska’s been doing this \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://pfd.alaska.gov/Division-Info/historical-timeline\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">since the 1980s\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, paying out oil dividends to all its residents — on average, about $1,600 a year. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But more recently, about 90 guaranteed-income experiments have popped up across the country. Most were inspired by one city: Stockton, California.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL TUBBS\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hello, my name is \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MichaelDTubbs?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor\">Michael Tubbs\u003c/a>. I am the former mayor of the city of Stockton, California. I’m the founder of \u003ca href=\"https://www.mayorsforagi.org/\">Mayors for a Guaranteed Income\u003c/a> and of \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/california-divide/2022/02/former-stockton-mayor-launches-nonprofit-to-end-poverty-in-california/\">End Poverty in California.\u003c/a>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael led Stockton’s guaranteed-income program back in 2019. He says a lot of the issues that came across his desk all came back to the same thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Issues of poverty and lack and pervasive poverty and generational poverty.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Stockton was the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.theguardian.com/business/2008/jul/28/subprimecrisis.useconomy\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">foreclosure capital\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of the country during the Great Recession. It \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.reuters.com/article/us-stockton-bankruptcy/stockton-california-files-for-bankruptcy-idUSBRE85S05120120629\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">declared bankruptcy\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> in 2012. And today, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/about-seed\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">about a quarter\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of its population lives below the poverty line. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael wanted to bring a guaranteed income to Stockton because the old way of addressing poverty wasn’t working. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The programs we have now — like welfare or food stamps or housing vouchers — they have a lot of rules and regulations. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11882364\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11882364\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-800x533.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-800x533.jpeg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-1020x680.jpeg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-160x107.jpeg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut-1536x1024.jpeg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2021/07/RS46086_GettyImages-1208192668-qut.jpeg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michael Tubbs, former mayor of Stockton, is seen at his office in Stockton on Feb. 7, 2020. As mayor, with the help of the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration, he implemented an 18-month trial of universal basic income for 125 residents of his city. The concept has recently been gaining ground. \u003ccite>(Nick Otto/AFP via Getty Images))\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you’re on welfare, you have to spend so much time being with case managers, filling out forms, doing this, doing that, which robs you of the ability to do all the other things you need to do. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Guaranteed-income programs don’t require all that micromanagement, which frees up people’s time. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And, they have another benefit: You can spend the money however you need. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Whether it’s on new tires, a transmission, a new washer and dryer, school clothes, a wedding, going to visit your parents you haven’t seen in a while.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When people in Stockton were given the choice of how to use the $500 they got each month, they tended to spend it on food and other essentials.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some also used it to help pay for housing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They were able to sort of save up for a down payment to move to safer living conditions. Or some people use it to cope with sort of small rises in rent that occur: $50 here or $100 here, $125 here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Researchers in Stockton didn’t look specifically at the impact of a guaranteed income on evictions. But the small stipend could help. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/12/upshot/eviction-prevention-solutions-government.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most people get evicted for $600 or less\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, according to a New York Times analysis. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just knowing you have enough money to get to the end of the month also goes a long way for your mental health.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Folks who received the guaranteed income went from elevated levels of stress to regular levels of stress. And that just was like, wow, like money really sort of affects health and mental health and well-being and how we show up in the world. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But probably one of the biggest findings from Stockton: \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It challenged a widely held criticism of guaranteed income, that it would cause people to stop working. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The money actually had the opposite effect. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/employment\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People worked \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">About \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.stocktondemonstration.org/employment\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">12% went from part-time to full-time work\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. That’s more than double the control group. And participants were less likely to be unemployed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I wasn’t surprised, but I’m glad the data validated this belief that that $500 was not going to make anyone stop working, that people still worked.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael says that’s because it wasn’t enough to live on. But it gave people some breathing room. It allowed them to quit one of their part-time jobs and look for full-time work.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Or go back to school to change careers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It allowed people the chance to live. And live a life, and live a life beyond just going through the motions and working and going to sleep and working, going to sleep. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Still, critics say you shouldn’t draw too many conclusions from one small pilot program — with only 125 participants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rolling out a guaranteed income nationally could have a much bigger impact on the economy. And many worry that all that extra cash would only cause prices to rise, setting off higher inflation. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guaranteed income also does nothing to solve a larger problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The thing we \u003ca href=\"https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cesan.nr0.htm#:~:text=%2D%2DHousing%20expenditures%20increased%203.5,dwellings%20were%20down%200.5%20percent.\">spend the most money on is housing\u003c/a>. And that just keeps going up. Taking a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/10/home-prices-are-now-rising-much-faster-than-incomes-studies-show.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">bigger and bigger piece\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> out of our paychecks.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Guaranteed income is great, but we don’t want all that money to be spent on housing because people have other needs, right? So I think a guaranteed income is a powerful tool. But like any toolbox, you need more than one tool to really get the job done. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music in)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Guaranteed income can’t solve poverty on its own. But Michael says it’s a good place to start if we want to solve other big problems, like evictions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Evictions perpetuate inequality, a\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">nd they push more people into poverty. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> When you’re evicted, you lose your neighborhood, your school, your support network. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can be trapped in a cycle of debt, even become homeless. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But the solutions are within our reach, and people are already pushing for them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Activists in Fresno are fighting for a fair shot in court. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tenants in Antioch are demanding more protection against rising rents. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And women like \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11905386/why-black-women-are-more-likely-to-face-eviction\">Jean [Kendrick, from Episode 2]\u003c/a> are sharing their stories and calling attention to inequities we can’t unsee. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Evictions reflect our housing system: who reaps the profit and who suffers the pain.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But we have an opportunity to make the system more fair, to invest in people’s success, not just for a few, but for all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The question is, will we take it? \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m Molly Solomon. Thank you so much for listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you like what you hear, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts — and share it with a friend!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We’ve got one more thing that we’re working on. It’s a bonus episode full of stories from you. That’ll drop in a few weeks, so stay tuned. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sold Out is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us: Molly Solomon and Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. And Rob Speight wrote our theme song.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Thank you to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thank you for listening! \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>(Music out)\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "the-landlords-game-who-has-the-power-to-evict",
"title": "The Landlord's Game: Who Has the Power to Evict?",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Getting evicted can hinder a renter’s ability to find stable housing for years afterward. And the capacity to evict gives landlords a lot of power over their tenants.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this episode of Sold Out, we explore when and why landlords decide to evict. We also look at how property ownership has shifted in recent years from largely small “mom and pop” landlords to an increasing number of investors and corporations — and what that means for tenants and our housing system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC9294160459&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>THE LANDLORD’S GAME [TRANSCRIPT]\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Birds whistling, gravel, road, someone walking)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN BALDASSARI, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s a warm fall day in Antioch, California, and Donna Ridge has spent the morning delivering eviction notices. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s the property manager for a local landlord, Kevin Davidson, and also one of his tenants. We gather around Donna’s small kitchen table. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Papers being shuffled)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA RIDGE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, you got some three-day-notices.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN DAVIDSON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mm-hmm.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin owns around 100 apartments spread across 15 buildings in the San Francisco Bay Area. And California’s eviction moratorium had just expired about a month earlier. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: The reporter, Erin, is talking to Donna and Kevin in person)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How many do you have?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Total? I don’t know. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have three here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can’t count that high.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You got three, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY SOLOMON, HOST\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin says that during the pandemic, about a third of his tenants stopped paying rent at one point or another. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of these tenants are really good tenants. They didn’t deliberately get behind, but when they did, I mean, bills still have to be paid, you know? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most tenants who fell behind received rent relief. But for some, it didn’t cover everything they owed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They gotta start paying. Once rent relief has paid up their part, then they gotta pay their part and if they don’t pay, then …\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They get noticed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They get a notice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Each tenant was struggling for a different reason. One guy told Donna he gave his rent money to his roommate, the leaseholder. But the leaseholder wasn’t paying rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s not my problem. My problem is that you need to pay your rent, and you need to pay it on time like everybody else does. You know? That’s the way it works.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another tenant stopped paying rent at the beginning of the pandemic. And while the state had given her the maximum amount of rent relief, she still owed more.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now this woman here, we’ll probably have to end up evicting her.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna says the tenant had just started going back to work. But then her son ended up in the hospital. Understandably difficult, but by this point Donna had been trying to get her rent money for a year and a half.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s got excuse after excuse. Basically, I think she bit off more than she could chew, is what it is. Now she says she doesn’t want to move at all, and I said, “Well, then you better start paying rent.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> With the eviction notices delivered, Kevin has a decision to make. He could work out a deal and maybe come up with a payment plan so his tenants could catch up on missed rent. Or he could file an eviction lawsuit.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If he does file a lawsuit, his tenant could have as little as five days to find a new place to live — no easy task with rents that just keep rising. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s really a tight rental market right now, so these guys would be smart to pay their rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All landlords have the power to evict. But they don’t all wield that power in the same way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve learned it depends a lot on who\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">the landlord is — and that’s\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">changing. Large corporations are scooping up more rental properties, and as they do, their relationship with tenants becomes less personal and more profit-driven. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From KQED, you’re listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. This season, we’re talking about evictions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: The business of being a landlord — and when it pays to evict. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11839127\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 657px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11839127\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"657\" height=\"337\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png 657w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336-160x82.png 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 657px) 100vw, 657px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED’s podcast Sold Out looks at the history of and solutions to California’s housing crisis. \u003ccite>(KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To understand how landlords make decisions about evictions, it helps to know why they got into the business. When I asked Kevin, he said he sort of fell into it. He started working as a property manager to help pay his way through college.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Highways, cars driving nearby, street sounds)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I kind of learned the business a little bit, and I saw the people that were the owners and they seem to be doing pretty good. So I figure that, you know, long term, this would be a good thing to do.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> He bought his first rental property — a single-family home — around 40 years ago, while still holding down a day job at an oil refinery. A few years later, he bought a triplex.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I had just gone from there. What happens is property goes up, you refinance it, buy another. Two properties go up, you refinance it and buy another.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now, he doesn’t need a day job. And he’s not what you’d call a mom-and-pop landlord. He’s bigger than that — more of a mid-sized investor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the most part, my main investment is real estate.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s done well. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Erin laughs.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, it’s done well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s not all profit, though. He says the maintenance, mortgages, property taxes and insurance cost about 65 to 70% of what he gets in rent. The rest he keeps.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So your profit margin’s somewhere around 30, 35%.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Most of Kevin’s properties are on the eastern edge of the Bay Area. They’re in low-income neighborhoods. Even if it seems counterintuitive, he says that’s where you get a bigger bang for your buck.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And studies back that up. Researchers from Princeton and MIT found that on average, landlords in low-income neighborhoods took home\u003c/span> \u003ca href=\"https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/701697?mobileUi=0#_i9\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">double the profit\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, compared to landlords in wealthy neighborhoods.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s because they have lower mortgages and property taxes. And despite living in worse neighborhoods, tenants pay about the same in rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Kevin’s business model of specializing in low-income neighborhoods doesn’t always work out — for him or his tenants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He co-owns an RV park and marina in Bethel Island, a small town more than an hour’s drive from San Francisco. County officials there have labeled it a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/02/09/dozens-to-be-evicted-in-messy-battle-over-illegal-east-bay-rv-park/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">public nuisance\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Officials say it was never properly permitted to begin with — even though people had been living there before Kevin and his business partner bought the place back in 2004.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The county and the owners reached a stalemate over how to bring the place up to code. So in November, the owners told the 30-or-so tenants they had to leave. But most had nowhere to go. They stayed and saw bad conditions get worse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The electricity was cut off in late January, shared bathrooms boarded up and trash service stopped. A few weeks later, a fire broke out in one of the RVs, sending a woman to the hospital with severe burns. She had been using a propane heater to stay warm.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The rents there are about as cheap as they get in the Bay Area, with people paying around $400 to $750 a month.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Deanna Hughes moved into a houseboat on the marina about a year ago. She says a lot of her neighbors survive on disability checks or social security. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DEANNA HUGHES\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is what they have, you know? Might not be the best place, but it’s a home. It’s a roof over their head. And where are they going to be when they don’t have this, you know? We have enough homeless people in the state of California, I think, without them adding to it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin says he feels bad for the long-term tenants who have lived there for years. But he felt like the situation had just spiraled too far out of control. And, he and his partner are now in the process of selling the property. But first, they have to get everyone out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin typically tries to avoid\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">evictions as much as possible. Because they’re expensive. Each time, he has to pay courts and legal services more than $500 in fees. It can cost even more if he has to hire a lawyer. He might go through that whole process only to end up working out a deal with the tenant at the courthouse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we don’t want them to leave. When they leave, they cost more money than it does if they just pay.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I asked Kevin if he ever lowered someone’s rent, given the cost of evictions and turnover. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Highway, cars on the road, air whistling)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Well, I don’t really do that much because word gets around. And so if you do it for one person, then you got to start doing it for other people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Usually, though, if one of his tenants is having trouble coming up with rent, it’s not Kevin they call, it’s his property manager, Donna.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I met up with her one day while she was making the rounds at Kevin’s properties. It was 100 degrees outside, and Donna was sweating under the afternoon sun. But she was still out there raking up debris.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna does all kinds of odd jobs for Kevin. On this particular day, there was a duck — a dead duck.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A dead duck? Oh, well, then let’s get that cleaned up then. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who would do that? That’s disgusting. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says there’s always something. As Donna repaired a fence, tenants driving by slowed down to wave or call out a quick hello. Others walked over to chat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: A drill being operated, highway sounds, wind whistling)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TENANT SPEAKING TO DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Annabele, she’s starting to stand up by herself now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, no, not already!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TENANT\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, she’s going to start walking.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Donna, being friendly with the tenants is easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of them say, you know, you’re so great to work with. They’re all, because you understand things, because I’m a tenant, too.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In exchange for her work as property manager, Kevin pays Donna’s utility bills. He also bought the big white truck she drives around when she does maintenance on the properties. Those visits have another benefit, though — they help her keep tabs on folks who are behind on rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You have your rent? You have your rent? She better have the rent. She owes last month’s, too. But see, we were working with her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JILLIAN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have it all. Just about.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Good girl.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JILLIAN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’ll be there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Get it all, girl. See ya later. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna’s the buffer between Kevin and his tenants. She talks with them, tries to get a sense for why they’re behind, and she can help plead their case to Kevin. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, they’ll call me, and then I’ll call him. And he’ll either say, OK, that’s OK. Or, yeah, we’ll wait. Or he won’t. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I asked Kevin how he felt about serving evictions, knowing that an eviction judgment on your record makes it really hard to find another place to live.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I don’t like it. That’s why I talk to them. That’s why I try to set up payment plans. That’s why we give them every opportunity to pay. But if they don’t, then they can’t live there for free. So we go through with the eviction.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kevin’s approach to evictions is pretty common. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/philipgarboden\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Philip Garboden\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> researches landlord behavior at the University of Hawaii.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP GARBODEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sometimes I feel like the sort of public discussion of eviction assumes that landlords love evicting tenants, right? But almost every landlord we talked to felt that actually evicting a tenant was a business failure and a significant business cost.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most landlords who start the eviction process don’t actually follow through. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a review of over \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://abell.org/sites/default/files/files/cd-justicediverted216.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">150,000 eviction notices in Baltimore\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, just under 5% resulted in a court-ordered eviction where a tenant was forced out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Phillip says even if tenants do end up staying, most landlords see real benefits from filing that first notice. Because it helps them \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://evictionlab.org/serial-eviction-filings/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">collect rent\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The goal of the eviction is to — what one landlord called the “first shot over the bow” — to show that tenant that if they don’t pay, there’s going to be severe consequences and those consequences are going to be backed up by the legal system. And those consequences will be lasting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And there are other benefits for landlords.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Many of our landlords explained to us that by filing, they recognize that a tenant is less likely to complain about property issues, right? Is much less likely to, you know, report a landlord.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you owe someone money, it changes your relationship. You’re probably going to try to avoid them as much as possible. And if that person is your landlord, there’s an added layer of anxiety because your housing’s on the line.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And now all of a sudden you have a relationship where in order for that family to stay stably housed, they need to pay back their debt to a landlord. And the way that we treat people to whom we owe money is a fundamentally different social relationship, has fundamentally different power dynamics, than the way we treat people who we buy or rent things from. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says eviction notices help landlords flex their power over their tenants. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But that power imbalance is\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> established much earlier, during the tenant-screening process.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Landlords have all the power to sort of give access to families or to deny access to families.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Kevin’s case, that screening process starts with Donna. She’s in charge of posting his apartments on Craigslist and sorting through applications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We ask that they make double the rent, and they have the means to be able to support their children, like if the emergency happened, if they fell and broke an arm or leg or whatever, that they could handle that and the rent still, you know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says there’s one red flag they always look for. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mainly, no evictions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They make a few exceptions but most of the time, they pass. Because whatever the reason, it could happen again, and they don’t want to take that chance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says that’s the way a lot of landlords operate. And it makes sense: They want tenants who will pay rent on time. All this to say, if you have past evictions, a low income, bad credit, or kids, it can be very hard to find a landlord willing to rent you a home.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That becomes much more of this relationship of, you’re applying for admission, right? And the fewer resources, the lower income, the more income volatility that a particular family experiences, the stronger that power dynamic is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This power imbalance between landlords and tenants, it’s nothing new. But in some cases, it’s growing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: What to expect when your landlord is a corporation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Game pieces being thrown onto a game board, shuffling of objects)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA KELLY, EDITOR\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So everybody gets how much money? $1,500? I can’t remember what we start with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I can’t remember what we start with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, wow, I didn’t even know we started with that much. \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Molly laughs.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you gotta be able to pay rent, you gotta be able to buy stuff.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s our editor, Erika Kelly. We all got together the other day for a game we all played as kids. You can probably guess what it is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>MONOPOLY COMMERCIAL CIRCA 1981\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To make it big, you’ve got to play the game. I’m Monopoly Game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> For everyone who’s played Monopoly, you know the point of the game: Buy up all the properties and get as rich as possible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you want to bankrupt everybody else. If you don’t buy stuff, there’s no way to make money.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was pretty clear who was dominating the game.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: There’s not even even any $100 bills left in here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know, because Erika has them all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They are all over here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(All three players laugh.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But this version of the game we all know, that’s not the way the game was intended\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">to be played.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The original concept came from a woman named Lizzie Magie. Her version of the game \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/business/behind-monopoly-an-inventor-who-didnt-pass-go.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">came out in 1903\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a time when a lot of people really struggled to pay rent. And she wanted the game to be a cautionary tale. Not to glorify capitalism, but steer people away\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">from it. She called it: The Landlord’s Game.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In Magie’s version of the game, there were two ways to play: the version we know today, and one where everyone shared the profit. In real life, there are also different ways for landlords to play. Some just want a steady income. But increasingly, others are out to own the whole board. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Up until the late ‘80s, the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/1998/demo/h121-98-01.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">vast majority\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of landlords owned fewer than five units — you know, mom and pops. That began to change as more midsized players, like Kevin, got into the game. And corporations\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">began buying more and more apartment buildings. Companies now own at least \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/data-tools/demo/rhfs/#/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">two-thirds\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of all apartment buildings nationwide. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And it’s not just apartments. According to the Census Bureau, nearly\u003c/span> \u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/data-tools/demo/rhfs/#/?s_type=1&s_tableName=TABLE2&s_byGroup1=3&s_filterGroup1=2\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">3 million single-family homes \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">are now owned by LLCs, LLPs or LPs — shell companies that mask the identity of the true owner. And each one of those houses has a tenant who pays rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Neal Dennis III was one of those tenants. He’s a former security guard and a father of seven. In 2015, he and his family moved into a new home in Antioch. Two years later, Neal wasn’t getting as many hours at work, and bills began piling up. He and his wife had to make a choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL DENNIS III\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know PG&E was going up in the house. Water, garbage, you know, all that adds up so when you’re trying to divvy it out to everybody, somebody is going to get cut short sometimes. We need water, we need PG&E. Well, rent is going to be a little short this month.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the first time, Neal was late paying rent. His landlord was Waypoint Homes. At the time, Neal had no idea the company owned more than \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160105006880/en/Colony-Starwood-Homes-Announces-Closing-of-7.7-Billion-Merger-of-Starwood-Waypoint-Residential-Trust-with-Colony-American-Homes-Creating-the-Premier-Single-Family-REIT\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">23,000 homes across four states\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. When he fell behind, no one offered to get him on a payment plan. Instead …\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they filed within a week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After not paying?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> After not paying.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wow, that’s so quick. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it was quick.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Did anyone call you ahead of time? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, we just got a letter in the mail, you know, and a letter on the door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Neal couldn’t afford a lawyer who might’ve worked out a deal. So, he and his wife agreed to pay the back rent, and then packed up to leave.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We tried to track down Waypoint for comment, but the company \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://news.theregistrysf.com/gi-partners-sells-waypoint-portfolio-colony-starwood-815mm/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">no longer exists\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just a few months after Neal and his family were evicted, it was swallowed up in a string of consolidations by \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://news.theregistrysf.com/gi-partners-sells-waypoint-portfolio-colony-starwood-815mm/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">larger\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.housingwire.com/articles/41839-invitation-homes-starwood-waypoint-homes-merge-to-create-largest-single-family-landlord/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">larger\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> players, eventually merging with Invitation Homes — the country’s largest owner of single-family rentals. Today, they own more than \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://s28.q4cdn.com/264003623/files/doc_financials/2021/q4/Q4-2021-Supplemental_FINAL.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">81,000 across 12 states\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11906470\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11906470 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-800x545.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"545\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-800x545.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1020x695.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1536x1047.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-2048x1396.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1920x1308.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This graphic shows the growth of Invitation Homes over time and its mergers with other large single-family-home landlords. \u003ccite>(Graphic courtesy of Desiree Fields/UC Berkeley. Graphic by Manon Vergerio/independent researcher and Desiree Fields/UC Berkeley)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Their rapid growth is emblematic of a big shift towards corporate landlords. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://fcic-static.law.stanford.edu/cdn_media/fcic-reports/fcic_final_report_chapter22.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Millions of families lost their homes\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> to foreclosure during the 2008 housing bust. And many of them became renters. New corporate landlords took advantage of dirt-cheap prices, buying up homes by the thousands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/fieldsdesiree\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Desiree Fields\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> is a professor of geography and urban studies at the University of California in Berkeley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE FIELDS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it is this huge loss of wealth at the household level that is what enables these players to get their start. So there’s something important there, right? This, \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">like, v\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">ery direct transfer of wealth from Main Street to Wall Street.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Invitation Homes was founded in 2012 by Blackstone — one of the biggest private equity firms in the world. Invitation Homes CEO Dallas Tanner \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2cAVzYwnyo\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">recently told\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> the podcast RealWealth the fact that the company owns so many homes is a good thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2cAVzYwnyo\">\u003cb>\u003cem>DALLAS TANNER ON REALWEALTH SHOW\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can drive down the costs because of our economies of scale in terms of how we, you know, fit and finish your home, offer upgraded standards within a home, whether it’s kitchens, countertops, master bathrooms, whatever. And the law of large numbers really helps us create a better product at a more affordable price.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those cost savings don’t appear to be passed on to tenants. Instead, they go to investors as profits. Invitation Homes increased rents \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://s28.q4cdn.com/264003623/files/doc_news/Q4-2021-Supplemental_Press-Release-FINAL.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">last year\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> by an average of 9%. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That translated into more than $260 million in profits paid out to shareholders.\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The company capitalized on increased demand for single-family rentals during the pandemic. And they continued to buy up more homes, even amid sky-high prices.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They can kind of outcompete would-be-owner occupiers. And that, in turn, just kind of shunts people back into the rental market and increases demand for essentially the products the invitation homes is renting out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Despite its financial success, the company has recently come under fire, and a big part of that has to do with evictions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://coronavirus.house.gov/sites/democrats.coronavirus.house.gov/files/2021-07-19.Clyburn%20to%20Invitation%20Homes%20re%20Pandemic%20Evictions.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Congress is investigating\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Invitation Homes and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://coronavirus.house.gov/news/press-releases/clyburn-investigate-pandemic-evictions-corporate-landlords\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">three other big corporate landlords\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> for evicting people during the pandemic. The company filed more than\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lgntfTGWT4rbylrmtYDiEWJODbrHAofNMrKaqcHXG9E/edit#gid=2047\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> 1,300 evictions\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> last year alone, according to a compilation of court records by a watchdog group.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Invitation Homes wouldn’t agree to a recorded interview, but they said in a statement they’ve been trying to work with tenants during the pandemic, even signing up hundreds for rent relief. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But when it comes to its eviction practices, Invitation Homes isn’t that different from other big corporations. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2893552\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Studies\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> have shown corporate landlords are more likely to evict than smaller landlords, even two to three times more likely, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://academic.oup.com/sf/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/sf/soab063/6301048\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">according to one study out of Princeton.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Again, here’s University of Hawaii researcher Philip Garboden.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s big differences in how landlords do eviction, based on who that landlord is. T\u003c/span>he large corporate entities are much more likely to file quickly and a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says that’s partly because those decisions are standardized. And they’re not made by property managers like Donna. Notices go out automatically. It’s a process that doesn’t usually leave tenants much leeway to work out a deal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Warnings go out on the fifth of the month to all tenants who are late. Then by the seventh or ninth of the month there’s an official filing process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Corporate landlords are under extreme pressure to increase their profits. And Desiree Fields says they have other kinds of demands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They have imperatives to pay dividends to, you know, to their investors, to shareholders. They have large amounts of debt that they need to pay down. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Corporate landlords typically charge more fees for things like late rent, pets, pest control and parking. And while smaller landlords typically cover maintenance, corporate landlords are increasingly sticking tenants with those bills.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we see them increasing rents, but we also see them in general trying to squeeze the asset any way they can. So we see things like piling on lots of extra fees as a way of generating revenue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> After Neal Dennis III and his family were evicted, they did end up finding another place to live. It’s a small blue house with white trim, not far from where they were before. They’re coming up on five years in the house. And this time, Neal’s home is owned by a small landlord who lives in the area. He says the interactions are a lot more forgiving.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Look, if I’m going to be late, I’ll give him a call let him know, “Hey, I need until this time.” “No problem.” “I’ll have it in your account at this certain time.” “No problem.” Never no notice on my door. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In a lot of ways, what small landlords are looking for in tenants is pretty similar to what tenants want from their landlords: stability. Most have day jobs. They manage the properties themselves, and they don’t want a lot of extra work. So they \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01944363.2020.1798806\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">tend to charge their tenants less\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, because they want to hold onto them and reduce turnover.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’re looking for, you know, their rent checks to flow in as a supplement to their income. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But there are downsides to having a smaller landlord. Philip Garboden says a closer personal relationship with tenants can also lead to more friction.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When they feel a tenant is hiding from them or when they feel for whatever reason a tenant isn’t trying their hardest to pay the rent, things can go south in a hurry sort of emotionally.\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that can influence their decision to evict.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Small owners can be so frustrated that maybe they will go and execute an eviction, even if it’s not profitable for them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s also \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00031224211029618?journalCode=asra\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">evidence\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> that small landlords tend to rely on gut feelings, which can lead to all kinds of discrimination.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So there are trade-offs involved.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But big or small, all landlords hold a lot of power. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So just by virtue of, you know, having the resources to, you know, to purchase a property and own it, landlords are able to charge tenants for access to something that’s a fundamental human need, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And she says that points to a larger, systemic problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We treat housing as a market commodity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s something to be bought and sold, to make money off of.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, Desiree says you can hate certain players, especially the ones who are trying to squeeze every last penny from their tenants. But, it’s the game that’s rigged. Big corporations are just taking it to its logical end, by trying to make the most money possible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I do think that’s incompatible with the idea of having housing that is meaningfully affordable, but also to a system where people feel like they have like some power and control over, like, their basic living conditions and, you know, the kinds of choices they’re able to make about their housing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Owning property has been the main way for middle-class people to build wealth in this country. And, for people who’ve been able to buy into that system, it’s worked really well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But as rents continue to rise, and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/07/19/more-u-s-households-are-renting-than-at-any-point-in-50-years/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more people\u003c/span>\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://www.nmhc.org/research-insight/quick-facts-figures/quick-facts-resident-demographics/renters-and-owners/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">become renters\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, property ownership is increasingly benefiting a smaller group.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which raises the question: Is the system we’ve got the one we want? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And is it time to check some of that power and profits, to make sure we all have a place to live?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Coming up on Sold Out: fighting evictions in the courts. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How activists across the country are leveling the playing field between landlords and tenants.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>D.J. \u003c/b>\u003cb>CRINER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Are you going to hold landlords just as accountable as landlords think they’re holding residents? Are you going to give individuals an opportunity to have legal aid? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JOHN POLLOCK\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These are very serious proceedings on par with criminal ones in terms of the consequences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>RANDY \u003c/b>\u003cb>DILLARD\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No tenant should have to stand before a judge and not know their rights.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. You’ve been listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you like what you hear, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts — it really helps us share the show.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Sold Out is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us, Molly Solomon and Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. Rob Speight wrote our theme song. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next week!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "The Landlord's Game: Who Has the Power to Evict? | KQED",
"description": "Getting evicted can hinder a renter's ability to find stable housing for years afterward. And the capacity to evict gives landlords a lot of power over their tenants. In this episode of Sold Out, we explore when and why landlords decide to evict. We also look at how property ownership has shifted in recent years from largely small “mom and pop” landlords to an increasing number of investors and corporations — and what that means for tenants and our housing system. THE LANDLORD’S GAME (Sounds: Birds whistling, gravel, road, someone walking) ERIN BALDASSARI, HOST: It’s a warm fall day",
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"headline": "The Landlord's Game: Who Has the Power to Evict?",
"datePublished": "2022-02-28T03:01:03-08:00",
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"source": "SOLD OUT",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Getting evicted can hinder a renter’s ability to find stable housing for years afterward. And the capacity to evict gives landlords a lot of power over their tenants.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this episode of Sold Out, we explore when and why landlords decide to evict. We also look at how property ownership has shifted in recent years from largely small “mom and pop” landlords to an increasing number of investors and corporations — and what that means for tenants and our housing system.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC9294160459&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>THE LANDLORD’S GAME [TRANSCRIPT]\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Birds whistling, gravel, road, someone walking)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN BALDASSARI, HOST\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s a warm fall day in Antioch, California, and Donna Ridge has spent the morning delivering eviction notices. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s the property manager for a local landlord, Kevin Davidson, and also one of his tenants. We gather around Donna’s small kitchen table. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Papers being shuffled)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA RIDGE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, you got some three-day-notices.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN DAVIDSON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mm-hmm.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin owns around 100 apartments spread across 15 buildings in the San Francisco Bay Area. And California’s eviction moratorium had just expired about a month earlier. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: The reporter, Erin, is talking to Donna and Kevin in person)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How many do you have?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Total? I don’t know. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have three here.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Can’t count that high.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You got three, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY SOLOMON, HOST\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin says that during the pandemic, about a third of his tenants stopped paying rent at one point or another. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some of these tenants are really good tenants. They didn’t deliberately get behind, but when they did, I mean, bills still have to be paid, you know? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most tenants who fell behind received rent relief. But for some, it didn’t cover everything they owed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They gotta start paying. Once rent relief has paid up their part, then they gotta pay their part and if they don’t pay, then …\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They get noticed. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They get a notice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Each tenant was struggling for a different reason. One guy told Donna he gave his rent money to his roommate, the leaseholder. But the leaseholder wasn’t paying rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s not my problem. My problem is that you need to pay your rent, and you need to pay it on time like everybody else does. You know? That’s the way it works.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Another tenant stopped paying rent at the beginning of the pandemic. And while the state had given her the maximum amount of rent relief, she still owed more.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now this woman here, we’ll probably have to end up evicting her.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna says the tenant had just started going back to work. But then her son ended up in the hospital. Understandably difficult, but by this point Donna had been trying to get her rent money for a year and a half.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She’s got excuse after excuse. Basically, I think she bit off more than she could chew, is what it is. Now she says she doesn’t want to move at all, and I said, “Well, then you better start paying rent.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> With the eviction notices delivered, Kevin has a decision to make. He could work out a deal and maybe come up with a payment plan so his tenants could catch up on missed rent. Or he could file an eviction lawsuit.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If he does file a lawsuit, his tenant could have as little as five days to find a new place to live — no easy task with rents that just keep rising. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s really a tight rental market right now, so these guys would be smart to pay their rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">All landlords have the power to evict. But they don’t all wield that power in the same way. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve learned it depends a lot on who\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">the landlord is — and that’s\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">changing. Large corporations are scooping up more rental properties, and as they do, their relationship with tenants becomes less personal and more profit-driven. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From KQED, you’re listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. This season, we’re talking about evictions. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: The business of being a landlord — and when it pays to evict. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11839127\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 657px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11839127\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"657\" height=\"337\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png 657w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336-160x82.png 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 657px) 100vw, 657px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED’s podcast Sold Out looks at the history of and solutions to California’s housing crisis. \u003ccite>(KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To understand how landlords make decisions about evictions, it helps to know why they got into the business. When I asked Kevin, he said he sort of fell into it. He started working as a property manager to help pay his way through college.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Highways, cars driving nearby, street sounds)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So I kind of learned the business a little bit, and I saw the people that were the owners and they seem to be doing pretty good. So I figure that, you know, long term, this would be a good thing to do.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> He bought his first rental property — a single-family home — around 40 years ago, while still holding down a day job at an oil refinery. A few years later, he bought a triplex.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I had just gone from there. What happens is property goes up, you refinance it, buy another. Two properties go up, you refinance it and buy another.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Now, he doesn’t need a day job. And he’s not what you’d call a mom-and-pop landlord. He’s bigger than that — more of a mid-sized investor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the most part, my main investment is real estate.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Why?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s done well. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Yeah. \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Erin laughs.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yes, it’s done well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s not all profit, though. He says the maintenance, mortgages, property taxes and insurance cost about 65 to 70% of what he gets in rent. The rest he keeps.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So your profit margin’s somewhere around 30, 35%.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Most of Kevin’s properties are on the eastern edge of the Bay Area. They’re in low-income neighborhoods. Even if it seems counterintuitive, he says that’s where you get a bigger bang for your buck.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And studies back that up. Researchers from Princeton and MIT found that on average, landlords in low-income neighborhoods took home\u003c/span> \u003ca href=\"https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/701697?mobileUi=0#_i9\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">double the profit\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, compared to landlords in wealthy neighborhoods.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s because they have lower mortgages and property taxes. And despite living in worse neighborhoods, tenants pay about the same in rent. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But Kevin’s business model of specializing in low-income neighborhoods doesn’t always work out — for him or his tenants. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He co-owns an RV park and marina in Bethel Island, a small town more than an hour’s drive from San Francisco. County officials there have labeled it a \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.mercurynews.com/2022/02/09/dozens-to-be-evicted-in-messy-battle-over-illegal-east-bay-rv-park/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">public nuisance\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Officials say it was never properly permitted to begin with — even though people had been living there before Kevin and his business partner bought the place back in 2004.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The county and the owners reached a stalemate over how to bring the place up to code. So in November, the owners told the 30-or-so tenants they had to leave. But most had nowhere to go. They stayed and saw bad conditions get worse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The electricity was cut off in late January, shared bathrooms boarded up and trash service stopped. A few weeks later, a fire broke out in one of the RVs, sending a woman to the hospital with severe burns. She had been using a propane heater to stay warm.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The rents there are about as cheap as they get in the Bay Area, with people paying around $400 to $750 a month.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Deanna Hughes moved into a houseboat on the marina about a year ago. She says a lot of her neighbors survive on disability checks or social security. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DEANNA HUGHES\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is what they have, you know? Might not be the best place, but it’s a home. It’s a roof over their head. And where are they going to be when they don’t have this, you know? We have enough homeless people in the state of California, I think, without them adding to it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin says he feels bad for the long-term tenants who have lived there for years. But he felt like the situation had just spiraled too far out of control. And, he and his partner are now in the process of selling the property. But first, they have to get everyone out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kevin typically tries to avoid\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">evictions as much as possible. Because they’re expensive. Each time, he has to pay courts and legal services more than $500 in fees. It can cost even more if he has to hire a lawyer. He might go through that whole process only to end up working out a deal with the tenant at the courthouse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, we don’t want them to leave. When they leave, they cost more money than it does if they just pay.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I asked Kevin if he ever lowered someone’s rent, given the cost of evictions and turnover. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Highway, cars on the road, air whistling)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Well, I don’t really do that much because word gets around. And so if you do it for one person, then you got to start doing it for other people.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Usually, though, if one of his tenants is having trouble coming up with rent, it’s not Kevin they call, it’s his property manager, Donna.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I met up with her one day while she was making the rounds at Kevin’s properties. It was 100 degrees outside, and Donna was sweating under the afternoon sun. But she was still out there raking up debris.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna does all kinds of odd jobs for Kevin. On this particular day, there was a duck — a dead duck.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A dead duck? Oh, well, then let’s get that cleaned up then. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who would do that? That’s disgusting. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says there’s always something. As Donna repaired a fence, tenants driving by slowed down to wave or call out a quick hello. Others walked over to chat.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: A drill being operated, highway sounds, wind whistling)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TENANT SPEAKING TO DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Annabele, she’s starting to stand up by herself now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, no, not already!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TENANT\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So, she’s going to start walking.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Donna, being friendly with the tenants is easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of them say, you know, you’re so great to work with. They’re all, because you understand things, because I’m a tenant, too.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In exchange for her work as property manager, Kevin pays Donna’s utility bills. He also bought the big white truck she drives around when she does maintenance on the properties. Those visits have another benefit, though — they help her keep tabs on folks who are behind on rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You have your rent? You have your rent? She better have the rent. She owes last month’s, too. But see, we were working with her. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JILLIAN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have it all. Just about.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Good girl.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JILLIAN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’ll be there.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Get it all, girl. See ya later. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Donna’s the buffer between Kevin and his tenants. She talks with them, tries to get a sense for why they’re behind, and she can help plead their case to Kevin. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, they’ll call me, and then I’ll call him. And he’ll either say, OK, that’s OK. Or, yeah, we’ll wait. Or he won’t. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I asked Kevin how he felt about serving evictions, knowing that an eviction judgment on your record makes it really hard to find another place to live.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>KEVIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Well, I don’t like it. That’s why I talk to them. That’s why I try to set up payment plans. That’s why we give them every opportunity to pay. But if they don’t, then they can’t live there for free. So we go through with the eviction.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Kevin’s approach to evictions is pretty common. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/philipgarboden\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Philip Garboden\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> researches landlord behavior at the University of Hawaii.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP GARBODEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Sometimes I feel like the sort of public discussion of eviction assumes that landlords love evicting tenants, right? But almost every landlord we talked to felt that actually evicting a tenant was a business failure and a significant business cost.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Most landlords who start the eviction process don’t actually follow through. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a review of over \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://abell.org/sites/default/files/files/cd-justicediverted216.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">150,000 eviction notices in Baltimore\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, just under 5% resulted in a court-ordered eviction where a tenant was forced out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Phillip says even if tenants do end up staying, most landlords see real benefits from filing that first notice. Because it helps them \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://evictionlab.org/serial-eviction-filings/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">collect rent\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The goal of the eviction is to — what one landlord called the “first shot over the bow” — to show that tenant that if they don’t pay, there’s going to be severe consequences and those consequences are going to be backed up by the legal system. And those consequences will be lasting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And there are other benefits for landlords.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Many of our landlords explained to us that by filing, they recognize that a tenant is less likely to complain about property issues, right? Is much less likely to, you know, report a landlord.\u003c/span>\u003cb> \u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When you owe someone money, it changes your relationship. You’re probably going to try to avoid them as much as possible. And if that person is your landlord, there’s an added layer of anxiety because your housing’s on the line.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And now all of a sudden you have a relationship where in order for that family to stay stably housed, they need to pay back their debt to a landlord. And the way that we treat people to whom we owe money is a fundamentally different social relationship, has fundamentally different power dynamics, than the way we treat people who we buy or rent things from. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says eviction notices help landlords flex their power over their tenants. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But that power imbalance is\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> established much earlier, during the tenant-screening process.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Landlords have all the power to sort of give access to families or to deny access to families.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Kevin’s case, that screening process starts with Donna. She’s in charge of posting his apartments on Craigslist and sorting through applications.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We ask that they make double the rent, and they have the means to be able to support their children, like if the emergency happened, if they fell and broke an arm or leg or whatever, that they could handle that and the rent still, you know?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">She says there’s one red flag they always look for. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DONNA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Mainly, no evictions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They make a few exceptions but most of the time, they pass. Because whatever the reason, it could happen again, and they don’t want to take that chance. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says that’s the way a lot of landlords operate. And it makes sense: They want tenants who will pay rent on time. All this to say, if you have past evictions, a low income, bad credit, or kids, it can be very hard to find a landlord willing to rent you a home.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That becomes much more of this relationship of, you’re applying for admission, right? And the fewer resources, the lower income, the more income volatility that a particular family experiences, the stronger that power dynamic is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This power imbalance between landlords and tenants, it’s nothing new. But in some cases, it’s growing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up: What to expect when your landlord is a corporation.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Game pieces being thrown onto a game board, shuffling of objects)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA KELLY, EDITOR\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So everybody gets how much money? $1,500? I can’t remember what we start with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I can’t remember what we start with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY: \u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oh, wow, I didn’t even know we started with that much. \u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Molly laughs.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you gotta be able to pay rent, you gotta be able to buy stuff.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s our editor, Erika Kelly. We all got together the other day for a game we all played as kids. You can probably guess what it is.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cb>MONOPOLY COMMERCIAL CIRCA 1981\u003c/b>\u003c/em>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">To make it big, you’ve got to play the game. I’m Monopoly Game. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> For everyone who’s played Monopoly, you know the point of the game: Buy up all the properties and get as rich as possible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yeah, you want to bankrupt everybody else. If you don’t buy stuff, there’s no way to make money.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was pretty clear who was dominating the game.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: There’s not even even any $100 bills left in here.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I know, because Erika has them all. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIKA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They are all over here. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(All three players laugh.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But this version of the game we all know, that’s not the way the game was intended\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">to be played.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The original concept came from a woman named Lizzie Magie. Her version of the game \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/business/behind-monopoly-an-inventor-who-didnt-pass-go.html\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">came out in 1903\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, a time when a lot of people really struggled to pay rent. And she wanted the game to be a cautionary tale. Not to glorify capitalism, but steer people away\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">from it. She called it: The Landlord’s Game.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In Magie’s version of the game, there were two ways to play: the version we know today, and one where everyone shared the profit. In real life, there are also different ways for landlords to play. Some just want a steady income. But increasingly, others are out to own the whole board. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Up until the late ‘80s, the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/1998/demo/h121-98-01.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">vast majority\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of landlords owned fewer than five units — you know, mom and pops. That began to change as more midsized players, like Kevin, got into the game. And corporations\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">began buying more and more apartment buildings. Companies now own at least \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/data-tools/demo/rhfs/#/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">two-thirds\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> of all apartment buildings nationwide. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And it’s not just apartments. According to the Census Bureau, nearly\u003c/span> \u003ca href=\"https://www.census.gov/data-tools/demo/rhfs/#/?s_type=1&s_tableName=TABLE2&s_byGroup1=3&s_filterGroup1=2\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">3 million single-family homes \u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">are now owned by LLCs, LLPs or LPs — shell companies that mask the identity of the true owner. And each one of those houses has a tenant who pays rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Neal Dennis III was one of those tenants. He’s a former security guard and a father of seven. In 2015, he and his family moved into a new home in Antioch. Two years later, Neal wasn’t getting as many hours at work, and bills began piling up. He and his wife had to make a choice.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL DENNIS III\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know PG&E was going up in the house. Water, garbage, you know, all that adds up so when you’re trying to divvy it out to everybody, somebody is going to get cut short sometimes. We need water, we need PG&E. Well, rent is going to be a little short this month.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For the first time, Neal was late paying rent. His landlord was Waypoint Homes. At the time, Neal had no idea the company owned more than \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160105006880/en/Colony-Starwood-Homes-Announces-Closing-of-7.7-Billion-Merger-of-Starwood-Waypoint-Residential-Trust-with-Colony-American-Homes-Creating-the-Premier-Single-Family-REIT\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">23,000 homes across four states\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. When he fell behind, no one offered to get him on a payment plan. Instead …\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I think they filed within a week.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">After not paying?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> After not paying.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Wow, that’s so quick. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, it was quick.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Did anyone call you ahead of time? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No, we just got a letter in the mail, you know, and a letter on the door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Neal couldn’t afford a lawyer who might’ve worked out a deal. So, he and his wife agreed to pay the back rent, and then packed up to leave.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We tried to track down Waypoint for comment, but the company \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://news.theregistrysf.com/gi-partners-sells-waypoint-portfolio-colony-starwood-815mm/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">no longer exists\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Just a few months after Neal and his family were evicted, it was swallowed up in a string of consolidations by \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://news.theregistrysf.com/gi-partners-sells-waypoint-portfolio-colony-starwood-815mm/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">larger\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.housingwire.com/articles/41839-invitation-homes-starwood-waypoint-homes-merge-to-create-largest-single-family-landlord/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">larger\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> players, eventually merging with Invitation Homes — the country’s largest owner of single-family rentals. Today, they own more than \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://s28.q4cdn.com/264003623/files/doc_financials/2021/q4/Q4-2021-Supplemental_FINAL.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">81,000 across 12 states\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11906470\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-11906470 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-800x545.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"545\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-800x545.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1020x695.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-160x109.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1536x1047.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-2048x1396.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Invitation-Homes-Growth-1920x1308.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This graphic shows the growth of Invitation Homes over time and its mergers with other large single-family-home landlords. \u003ccite>(Graphic courtesy of Desiree Fields/UC Berkeley. Graphic by Manon Vergerio/independent researcher and Desiree Fields/UC Berkeley)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Their rapid growth is emblematic of a big shift towards corporate landlords. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://fcic-static.law.stanford.edu/cdn_media/fcic-reports/fcic_final_report_chapter22.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Millions of families lost their homes\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> to foreclosure during the 2008 housing bust. And many of them became renters. New corporate landlords took advantage of dirt-cheap prices, buying up homes by the thousands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/fieldsdesiree\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Desiree Fields\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> is a professor of geography and urban studies at the University of California in Berkeley. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE FIELDS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it is this huge loss of wealth at the household level that is what enables these players to get their start. So there’s something important there, right? This, \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">like, v\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">ery direct transfer of wealth from Main Street to Wall Street.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Invitation Homes was founded in 2012 by Blackstone — one of the biggest private equity firms in the world. Invitation Homes CEO Dallas Tanner \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2cAVzYwnyo\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">recently told\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> the podcast RealWealth the fact that the company owns so many homes is a good thing. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2cAVzYwnyo\">\u003cb>\u003cem>DALLAS TANNER ON REALWEALTH SHOW\u003c/em>\u003c/b>\u003c/a>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can drive down the costs because of our economies of scale in terms of how we, you know, fit and finish your home, offer upgraded standards within a home, whether it’s kitchens, countertops, master bathrooms, whatever. And the law of large numbers really helps us create a better product at a more affordable price.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Those cost savings don’t appear to be passed on to tenants. Instead, they go to investors as profits. Invitation Homes increased rents \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://s28.q4cdn.com/264003623/files/doc_news/Q4-2021-Supplemental_Press-Release-FINAL.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">last year\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> by an average of 9%. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That translated into more than $260 million in profits paid out to shareholders.\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The company capitalized on increased demand for single-family rentals during the pandemic. And they continued to buy up more homes, even amid sky-high prices.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They can kind of outcompete would-be-owner occupiers. And that, in turn, just kind of shunts people back into the rental market and increases demand for essentially the products the invitation homes is renting out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Despite its financial success, the company has recently come under fire, and a big part of that has to do with evictions.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://coronavirus.house.gov/sites/democrats.coronavirus.house.gov/files/2021-07-19.Clyburn%20to%20Invitation%20Homes%20re%20Pandemic%20Evictions.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Congress is investigating\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Invitation Homes and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://coronavirus.house.gov/news/press-releases/clyburn-investigate-pandemic-evictions-corporate-landlords\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">three other big corporate landlords\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> for evicting people during the pandemic. The company filed more than\u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lgntfTGWT4rbylrmtYDiEWJODbrHAofNMrKaqcHXG9E/edit#gid=2047\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> 1,300 evictions\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> last year alone, according to a compilation of court records by a watchdog group.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Invitation Homes wouldn’t agree to a recorded interview, but they said in a statement they’ve been trying to work with tenants during the pandemic, even signing up hundreds for rent relief. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But when it comes to its eviction practices, Invitation Homes isn’t that different from other big corporations. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2893552\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Studies\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> have shown corporate landlords are more likely to evict than smaller landlords, even two to three times more likely, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://academic.oup.com/sf/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/sf/soab063/6301048\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">according to one study out of Princeton.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Again, here’s University of Hawaii researcher Philip Garboden.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s big differences in how landlords do eviction, based on who that landlord is. T\u003c/span>he large corporate entities are much more likely to file quickly and a lot.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Philip says that’s partly because those decisions are standardized. And they’re not made by property managers like Donna. Notices go out automatically. It’s a process that doesn’t usually leave tenants much leeway to work out a deal. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Warnings go out on the fifth of the month to all tenants who are late. Then by the seventh or ninth of the month there’s an official filing process. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Corporate landlords are under extreme pressure to increase their profits. And Desiree Fields says they have other kinds of demands. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> They have imperatives to pay dividends to, you know, to their investors, to shareholders. They have large amounts of debt that they need to pay down. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Corporate landlords typically charge more fees for things like late rent, pets, pest control and parking. And while smaller landlords typically cover maintenance, corporate landlords are increasingly sticking tenants with those bills.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we see them increasing rents, but we also see them in general trying to squeeze the asset any way they can. So we see things like piling on lots of extra fees as a way of generating revenue.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> After Neal Dennis III and his family were evicted, they did end up finding another place to live. It’s a small blue house with white trim, not far from where they were before. They’re coming up on five years in the house. And this time, Neal’s home is owned by a small landlord who lives in the area. He says the interactions are a lot more forgiving.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NEAL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Look, if I’m going to be late, I’ll give him a call let him know, “Hey, I need until this time.” “No problem.” “I’ll have it in your account at this certain time.” “No problem.” Never no notice on my door. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In a lot of ways, what small landlords are looking for in tenants is pretty similar to what tenants want from their landlords: stability. Most have day jobs. They manage the properties themselves, and they don’t want a lot of extra work. So they \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01944363.2020.1798806\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">tend to charge their tenants less\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, because they want to hold onto them and reduce turnover.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’re looking for, you know, their rent checks to flow in as a supplement to their income. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But there are downsides to having a smaller landlord. Philip Garboden says a closer personal relationship with tenants can also lead to more friction.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When they feel a tenant is hiding from them or when they feel for whatever reason a tenant isn’t trying their hardest to pay the rent, things can go south in a hurry sort of emotionally.\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And that can influence their decision to evict.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Small owners can be so frustrated that maybe they will go and execute an eviction, even if it’s not profitable for them. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There’s also \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00031224211029618?journalCode=asra\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">evidence\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> that small landlords tend to rely on gut feelings, which can lead to all kinds of discrimination.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PHILIP\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So there are trade-offs involved.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But big or small, all landlords hold a lot of power. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So just by virtue of, you know, having the resources to, you know, to purchase a property and own it, landlords are able to charge tenants for access to something that’s a fundamental human need, right? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And she says that points to a larger, systemic problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We treat housing as a market commodity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s something to be bought and sold, to make money off of.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, Desiree says you can hate certain players, especially the ones who are trying to squeeze every last penny from their tenants. But, it’s the game that’s rigged. Big corporations are just taking it to its logical end, by trying to make the most money possible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DESIREE\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I do think that’s incompatible with the idea of having housing that is meaningfully affordable, but also to a system where people feel like they have like some power and control over, like, their basic living conditions and, you know, the kinds of choices they’re able to make about their housing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Owning property has been the main way for middle-class people to build wealth in this country. And, for people who’ve been able to buy into that system, it’s worked really well.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But as rents continue to rise, and \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/07/19/more-u-s-households-are-renting-than-at-any-point-in-50-years/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more people\u003c/span>\u003c/a> \u003ca href=\"https://www.nmhc.org/research-insight/quick-facts-figures/quick-facts-resident-demographics/renters-and-owners/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">become renters\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, property ownership is increasingly benefiting a smaller group.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Which raises the question: Is the system we’ve got the one we want? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And is it time to check some of that power and profits, to make sure we all have a place to live?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Coming up on Sold Out: fighting evictions in the courts. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">How activists across the country are leveling the playing field between landlords and tenants.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>D.J. \u003c/b>\u003cb>CRINER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Are you going to hold landlords just as accountable as landlords think they’re holding residents? Are you going to give individuals an opportunity to have legal aid? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JOHN POLLOCK\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">These are very serious proceedings on par with criminal ones in terms of the consequences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>RANDY \u003c/b>\u003cb>DILLARD\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No tenant should have to stand before a judge and not know their rights.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I’m Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And I’m Erin Baldassari. You’ve been listening to Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you like what you hear, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts — it really helps us share the show.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Sold Out is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us, Molly Solomon and Erin Baldassari.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. Rob Speight wrote our theme song. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next week!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"slug": "a-suburb-with-an-eviction-problem",
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"content": "\u003cp>The place with the highest rate of evictions in the Bay Area during the pandemic wasn’t a big city like Oakland or San Francisco — instead it was a suburb that has been radically transformed by housing crisis after housing crisis. Antioch, a working-class town on the outskirts of the Bay, has seen an influx of Black and Brown folks pushed from more expensive cities in search of a place they can afford.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In our first episode of Season 2 of Sold Out, we visit a neighborhood in Antioch with a high concentration of evictions. We’ll hear from renters, activists and politicians to find out how a lack of affordable housing is remaking the suburbs, not just in the Bay Area but across the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4565731200&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evicted: A Suburban Story [TRANSCRIPT] \u003c/strong>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hey, I’m \u003cb>Erin Baldassari (host)\u003c/b>.\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m \u003c/span>\u003cb>Molly Solomon (host)\u003c/b>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We want to take you back in time — two years ago — to the beginning of the pandemic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: We were all told to shelter in place. And as housing reporters, our first thought — how will people pay rent? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: We heard from a lot of people who lost jobs, or had hours cut.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>LAURA YOPIHUA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t know what to do after that without job, without income.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People were forced to make really difficult decisions. Like choosing between buying groceries or paying rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>LAURA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t have any money to pay the bills. I just have saving the money for the food. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we heard from people afraid they’d end up on the streets.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE LOWERY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s just really scary right now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Entire families were at risk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have to have a roof over my head. You know, I just have to, and of course, my grandbabies and the whole family does.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Millions across the country were on the edge of eviction. The stakes could not have been higher. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>SAN FRANCISCO CITY ATTORNEY DAVID CHIU\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If tens of thousands of folks are forced from their homes, COVID will be much more likely to spread and have devastating consequences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: States, local governments, even the CDC knew they had to act — so they put in moratoriums to block evictions. And Congress handed out nearly $50 billion to help people catch up on missed rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If we don’t act now, there could be a wave of evictions and foreclosures in the coming months.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: But people were\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">still being evicted.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JANEE BRICE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The sheriff came out, and I ended up having to move with my daughter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">:\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And now, as those pandemic protections expire — it’s getting worse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In this season of Sold Out, we’re looking at the patterns of evictions. The ones in the headlines, and the ones that have quietly devastated lives for decades.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The more we looked at who is getting evicted and where, it became clear that evictions are a symptom of a larger problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Over the next few weeks, we’ll show you how this problem sits at the crossroads of inequality, racism, power and privilege.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we’ll introduce you to the people fighting for change.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From KQED, this is \u003c/span>Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Stay tuned.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11839127\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 657px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11839127\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"657\" height=\"337\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png 657w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336-160x82.png 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 657px) 100vw, 657px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED’s podcast Sold Out looks at the history of and solutions to California’s housing crisis. \u003ccite>(KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Birds, sprinklers on lawns, light happy music)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When most people think about the suburbs, they think about good schools and safe neighborhoods, single-family houses with manicured lawns, and white picket fences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tamisha Torres-Walker wanted that for her family. She’d rented her whole life, and was ready to buy a place where she could raise her two sons. When she looked around, she found that most parts of the San Francisco Bay Area were too expensive. But not Antioch.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA TORRES-WALKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch just showed up as like this place that was still affordable for people who wanted to become first-time homebuyers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Even though the place she found wasn’t her dream house, it checked a lot of boxes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The house picked me. It was like it had everything a single mom with two sons could need. We needed three bedrooms: It had it. I wanted a fireplace: It had it. My sons wanted dogs: It had a huge backyard.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2015, Tamisha bought her first home. But living in Antioch, she noticed a lot of other newcomers weren’t buying homes — they were renting. They’d been priced out of bigger cities, like San Francisco and Oakland.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The rental crisis, the unaffordability of, like, rents skyrocketing in the Bay Area is what started to push everybody else out this way.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Tamisha isn’t just a homeowner. She’s a city council member, has been for the last year. So we asked her to show us around.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch is home to more than 115,000 people. It’s a commuter town on the outer fringes of the Bay Area, about an hour’s drive from San Francisco. Highway 4 divides it in two.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re like right up against Highway 4 right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> On one side of the highway, there are rows and rows of single-family homes, peppered with strip malls, big box stores and a golf course. On the other side, there’s Tamisha’s district.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s a huge district — stretching about 15 miles along the San Joaquin River Delta. There’s a quaint, historic downtown, and a lot of industry. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we drive along the waterfront, she points out paper mills, chemical plants and oil refineries. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of people call it “Refinery Row.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Her district is also where a lot the apartment buildings and townhomes are. Especially in this one neighborhood — the Sycamore Corridor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is us, Sycamore Square, and a lot more apartments.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> On the neighborhood’s busiest street, there’s a small shopping center, with a liquor store, a smoke shop, and a fried fish and chicken joint.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So this, all of this, is high-density housing. Like, everything on this side of the street is all high-density housing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We came here because we’d been gathering data on pandemic evictions in the Bay Area. And when we crunched the numbers, Antioch stood out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was the city with the highest eviction rate\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> —\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> 22 times higher than in Oakland. Almost a year and a half into the pandemic, there had been 91 evictions in Antioch. In Oakland, a city four times bigger, there had been just 33. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://evictions.study/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-11904602 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-800x394.png\" alt=\"A map showing the number of evictions in East Bay Area cities, California, shaded in different colors to show lower and higher numbers.\" width=\"800\" height=\"394\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-800x394.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-1020x503.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-160x79.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM.png 1448w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But it’s important to note that our data only captures evictions enforced by the sheriff. And many people leave before that point, so we know even more people were evicted during that time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I thought that we were not supposed to be evicting people during a global pandemic.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The highest concentration of evictions in Antioch was right here in the Sycamore Corridor, and we saw clear signs of that as we drove around. As we turned one corner, we saw two houses with big piles of stuff on the front lawn. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s probably somebody being put out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> All of that stuff outside?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s probably somebody being put out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was furniture, kids’ toys, cardboard boxes with papers and letters spilling out of them — all of it wet. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Today’s the sixth. So that means that if you got a three-day ‘pay or quit’ on the first?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You might be out now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You might be out now, yeah. People might be starting to leave right now, yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A couple doors down, there was another empty house. The neighbors said the family had left months ago. An eviction notice was still taped to the front door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Talking to people in Tamisha’s district, it seemed like everyone had an eviction story. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATE HAYES\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They gave us a notice, and we didn’t really know what to do, so we just moved. I’ve been staying with my friends mostly. Just staying with my friends, and trying to get by.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DEVIN URBACH\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You know, it’s been so hard to get help. You have to really, like, know somebody that knows somebody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MARY ROBERTSON\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s not easy after you have an eviction. It’s not easy finding another place. It’s not easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is not the vision of the suburbs we thought we knew. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS SCHILDT\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve had this story that’s been told to us, that the suburbs is the place of white picket fences. And that has been true, but it’s never been the entire story.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/schildtchris\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Chris Schildt\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. She’s the director of the Regional Suburban Organizing Project. And she says, this idea that suburbs represent white middle-class success, that’s not really the case anymore. Across the country, suburbs are home to the largest and fastest-growing population of people living in poverty. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.brookings.edu/book/confronting-suburban-poverty-in-america/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s according to research from the Brookings Institution.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can’t deny there are more people of color living in the suburbs. There are more low-income people living in suburbs. There are more renters living in suburbs than ever before.\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we need to look at and understand what’s happening in suburban places like Antioch in order to understand what’s happening in this country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> The evictions we’re seeing in Antioch are tied to the nation’s housing crisis, and the seeds of those evictions were planted 30 years ago.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In the early ’90s, Antioch was a destination. There was a building boom going on, and a lot of middle-class people of color were moving in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of Latinx and African American folks who had moved out to buy a home, maybe to buy their first home, or to move into a bigger or better home from where they were living before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael Carter grew up in East Oakland, a historically Black neighborhood. He’s an investment banker, and in the early ’90s, he wanted a safer place to raise his two sons. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL CARTER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Seeing how Oakland was beginning to change and the amount of crime that I was beginning to notice, I didn’t want my boys growing up in that area.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He saw opportunity in Antioch. He found a really nice four-bedroom home for less than $150,000. It was in one of the fancier parts of town, out by a golf course.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That wasn’t going to happen in Oakland, no way.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Michael and his family were part of this wave of Black families moving to Antioch. It was a big shift for the city. In 1980, Antioch was almost \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/cities/Antioch70.htm\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">90% white\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, and it had a history as a sundown town. There had actually been laws in place to prohibit people of color from walking the streets after dark. Even after those laws were repealed, some people of color told us they still didn’t feel safe.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But between 1990 and 2000, the city’s Black population \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/cities/Antioch70.htm\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more than quadrupled\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, rising to almost 10% of the population. The Latino population doubled.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were actually seeing a diverse demographic moving to Antioch.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then the foreclosure crisis hit, and it hit families like Michael’s especially hard. He ended up losing his home and becoming a renter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">2008 hit and everything just got slammed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Foreclosures tore through low-income suburbs across the country. Again, here’s Chris Schildt: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was specifically low-income suburban cities with large African American, Latinx homeowners of color nationally that had the highest foreclosure rates.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Antioch, a quarter of all homeowners with mortgages lost their homes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That area was one of the hardest hit in the country for foreclosures. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Chris says that a lot of those homes weren’t bought by new homeowners — they were bought by investors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you saw this dramatic shift.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Over the past 20 years, the population in Antioch has continued to grow. But the number of homeowners has stayed relatively flat, even dropping slightly, while the number of renters grew by 60%.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was a complete flip. It went from being a home-owning community to a renter community in terms of who is moving in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A big part of that was surging rents in cities like San Francisco and Oakland, pushing renters further and further away in search of any place they could afford. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think Antioch’s story is unique.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can see the effects of gentrification in suburbs around Chicago, Atlanta, Boston. Places that were once affordable have gotten more and more expensive. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is part of a regional trend and part of a national trend of what’s happening in the suburbs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11616048\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11616048\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/09/Antioch_California-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The suburb of Antioch.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As more low-income renters move out to the suburbs, evictions there are going up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We talked to someone who studies this. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/team/tim-thomas-ph-d/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tim Thomas\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> is the research director at the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Urban Displacement Project at the University of California in Berkeley\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. And he says he noticed the same trend around Seattle: High prices there pushed people south of the city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TIM\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There were a lot of Black households, in particular, moving to South King County because that was the last affordable space to be. But now we see that’s the space where most evictions are happening. Over half of the evictions in the whole county are happening in very few neighborhoods where that displacement has happened.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not a coincidence that evictions are hitting Black neighborhoods the hardest, because evictions and race are deeply connected. When Tim looked at our data on evictions in the Bay Area, he saw that Black households were evicted at a higher rate than white households. It’s the same pattern he saw in Seattle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TIM\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In just one year of data, I found that Black women were getting evicted seven times more than white women, and Black households in general are getting evicted four times more than white households, which was a huge disparity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a lot of ways, the suburbs haven’t caught up to this new reality. They don’t typically have the money or staffing for social services that big cities have. Again, here’s Chris Schildt: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We really stopped investing in our suburbs in the ’80s and ’90s. In community infrastructure, in nonprofits and social services, in our schools. We’ve moved away from investing in our communities in general in the past 30, 40 years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, suburbs don’t have the kinds of renter protections that big cities have to help people stay in their homes. It leaves renters with few options when things do\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">go wrong. When that eviction notice gets taped to the front door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s coming up, after this break.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Advertisement]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: People walking, greeting one another)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hi, how are you? I’m Erin. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hi. Carmen.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hola,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">cómo estás?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bien, gracias.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We met Carmen Ponce at her apartment in Antioch. It’s a small place on the ground floor of a two-story building. And immediately, when you walk in, you see these boxes: big plastic bins stacked on top of each other, ready in case she needs to leave.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Si miras alrededor de mi apartamento, casi todo ya esta en caja, todo vacío.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Carmen lives here with her teenage daughter and 1-year-old granddaughter. She also has two adult sons who sometimes stay with her. Ever since they got an eviction notice, they’ve been living in this sort of limbo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The problems with her landlord started when the pandemic shut down businesses like hers. Carmen cuts hair at a barbershop in a town nearby. And because of COVID, she was out of work for almost a year. She fell behind on the $1,300 she pays in rent every month. It was a difficult time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pues,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">fue una temporada bien difícil, de verdad.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> So many people we talked to while reporting on evictions told us they were already struggling to pay rent. And then something else would happen, something that made catching up nearly impossible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Carmen’s case, she was shot just outside her home, in an incident that had nothing to do with her.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tengo mi hija que apenas tiene diecisiete años, y que tenía su bebe de un año, que yo me hago responsable de ella. Eso es que hace manternerme fuerte.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Carmen spent a month in the hospital and another four months recovering at home. She started working again last July, but it wasn’t full time. Then, things got a lot worse. Her property manager dropped off a notice at her door. It said, pay the back rent or get out. She owed at least $15,000.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A donde me voy con mi hija y con mi nieta? O sea, la única opción era sacar mis cosas en la calle y dormir en mi carro afuera.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Where would she go with her daughter and granddaughter? She thought their only option would be to stay in her car because she didn’t have enough money to move somewhere else.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At this point in the pandemic, Carmen was still covered by California’s eviction moratorium. So, rather than leaving right away, she waited. Legally, the landlord would need to file a formal eviction in court to actually force her out. But that lawsuit never came.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No para el acosto constante del manager. Porque también me hable por telefono, que cuando me voy a ir?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instead, Carmen says the property manager keeps harassing her, calling her again and again, asking her when she’s going to leave. They even gave her a second eviction notice in January this year, but they still haven’t filed a lawsuit.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>BOB GUNSON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was no harassment, it was just getting her attention.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Bob Gunson is Carmen’s property manager, and he says his office only called to get her signed up for the rent relief program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>BOB\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s the only reason. And we’ve got quite a few tenants. We’ve got some signed into that program, and they weren’t aware of it, and it’s helped them out a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Carmen did sign up for rent relief. She got a partial payout, but not for everything she owes, and doesn’t know when the rest of the money will come. Work has been slow, and she still isn’t making the same amount she was before the pandemic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yo estoy, pues, que no se que va pasar el dia de mañana.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> She says she doesn’t know what’s going to happen from one day to the next. It’s depressing, and Carmen knows there’s lots of people in Antioch going through the same thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Da tristeza, da tristeza en la situación en la que, en lo personal en la que yo me encuentro y en la que mucha gente en Antioch estamos viviendo porque yo se que todavía hay mucha gente que está pasando lo mismo que yo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11904499\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11904499\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"A woman in an apartment room stands to the left of boxes and plastic bins filled with her family's belongings.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Carmen Ponce inside her apartment in Antioch. After the business where she worked closed due to COVID’s effects on the economy, she has most of her belongings in boxes should she ever need to pick up and leave. \u003ccite>(Erin Baldassari, KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s because Antioch is becoming less affordable. During the pandemic, rents here shot up \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/antioch-ca\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">26%\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://bayareaequityatlas.org/indicators/housing-burden#/?breakdown=2&geo=07000000000602252\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nearly two-thirds of all Antioch renters\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> are cost burdened, meaning they pay more than a third of their income on housing. As housing gets more expensive, it’s harder to hold on to, especially for people living paycheck to paycheck. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That leads to more turnover. People leave, they’re priced out, or they’re evicted. City Councilmember Tamisha Torres-Walker says that churn hurts the whole community.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It creates anxiety, instability, it creates uncertainty, and that’s unfortunate because neighborhoods can’t thrive like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s one reason why Tamisha is helping to lead a growing movement of Antioch renters pushing for change — a movement that started in the Sycamore Corridor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s coming up after this break.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Advertisement]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a long time after Tamisha Torres-Walker moved to Antioch, it didn’t really feel like home. She was actually thinking about leaving. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then I started to care about the conditions in the community and actually like being here, and made a bigger commitment to change where I lived. So in a sense, I made a commitment to stay.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And she realized there wasn’t anyone on Antioch’s City Council who she felt really represented her district. So, she decided to run. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I heard not one elected official talk about the conditions in the community, the real issues and conditions in the community, here in this district.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Tamisha spent countless hours knocking on doors — a lot of it in the Sycamore Corridor. She talked to people, asking them what kinds of issues they were dealing with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, poverty, harm, violence, police misconduct and brutality, dilapidated conditions, just the quality of life, the way people were living.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of people were getting evicted. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were talking to people and they were telling us, ‘Oh, this person, that person next door don’t live here no more. They moved out last week.’ Like literally, like they got kicked out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">One man who would become instrumental in Tamisha’s campaign was Francisco Torres. He’s a tenant organizer for the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.acceaction.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Most people just call it ACCE.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As more low-income renters moved to suburbs like Antioch, Francisco’s seen the fight for renters’ rights follow close behind. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because it’s much more expensive now, it’s much more expensive, and there’s less and less places to move into.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When Francisco heard Tamisha was running for city council, he and other ACCE members jumped in to support her campaign.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the reason I got involved is because I knew that if Tamisha won, we could change the city council.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Maybe they would actually have a chance of passing policies to help renters. She did win, and that’s when their work really began.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch doesn’t have the history of tenant activism that you see in big cities like San Francisco or Los Angeles. And they knew Tamisha wouldn’t be able to get any new policies passed unless renters spoke up. So ACCE began recruiting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: A man knocking on a door)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JAIME CALDER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hello? How are you? My name is Jaime, I’m with ACCE institute.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They got people to write letters to their representatives, hold signs outside of City Hall, and show up on Zoom meetings.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE LOWERY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi, can everyone hear me? OK. Good evening, Mayor, city council members, staff and residents of Antioch. My name is Jackie Lowery and I’m a resident of Antioch, a renter, and a member of ACCE.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> The Antioch City Council is now actively debating tenant protections, and renters are\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">showing up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My family and I moved to Antioch for a better life. But from what I’ve been seeing in our city with our tax-paying and rent-paying citizens is shameful. You have a rental community in Antioch that needs your help right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CITY COUNCIL SPEAKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Families are struggling to pay their rent, and live with the daily worry if the next rent increase will be what puts them out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CITY COUNCIL SPEAKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rents are constantly increasing. Many of us are just going back to work because of the pandemic. We simply can’t afford the high rents and don’t see a way forward.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’re demanding three big things: a cap on yearly rent increases, a new law to make it illegal for landlords to harass their tenants, and another that makes it harder for landlords to evict. It’s the first time renters are pushing for these kinds of protections in Antioch. And it’s by no means a sure thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Lots of people don’t want these policies to pass — landlords and other property owners don’t want more government regulation. Not to mention a couple city council members who are pushing back. There’s more meetings on the books before the council will cast their final votes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But no matter what happens with these proposals, Tamisha is hopeful.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People are organizing. There are people who are organizing themselves as they’re starting to see that they need to create a voice from the ground. And I think that’s the greatest change any community could see is people building community.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Renters are taking a stand, and fighting to stay in Antioch. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think that’s happened here in Antioch, especially for people who have transitioned here. And I see it happening now and I’m excited about it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some people don’t even realize that you could actually fight in a big group, and win.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Francisco and members of ACCE, there’s no fight more important than the fight to stay housed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s important to protect that, because what else do you have if you don’t have a home?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s the question that really got us thinking about evictions in the first place. Because home is the center of our lives, where we can be ourselves. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It shapes our identities and keeps our families safe. And if we suddenly had to leave, we’d feel lost, disconnected. But that’s what happens when you’re evicted — you lose your home, and so much more. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up on \u003c/span>Sold Out:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We’ll look at who’s more likely to be on the receiving end of evictions, and how the consequences can follow you for years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JEAN KENDRICK\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s hard. Not even my worst enemy, I wouldn’t wish this on. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>U.S. REPRESENTATIVE CORI BUSH\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who speaks for us, and who speaks for single parents? Who speaks for Black women? Who speaks for us?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACOB FABER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I would argue that one of the biggest reasons, if not the biggest reason, is this weight of history.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: Sold Out \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us, Erin Baldassari and Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. Rob Speight wrote our theme song. Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer, and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you liked this episode, we think you’ll like another podcast from KQED, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/series/american-suburb-podcast/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">American Suburb\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. A big thank-you to Sandhya Dirks, whose previous reporting on Antioch really helped guide us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next week!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>For more in-depth reporting on the housing crisis, check out our podcast, Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sold-out-rethinking-housing-in-america/id1531354937?itsct=podcast_box&itscg=30200\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/show/38dTBSk2ISFoPiyYNoKn1X\">Spotify\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/911586047/s-o-l-d-o-u-t-rethinking-housing-in-america#:~:text=SOLD%20OUT%3A%20Rethinking%20Housing%20in%20America%20%3A%20NPR&text=SOLD%20OUT%3A%20Rethinking%20Housing%20in%20America%20A%20podcast%20that%20examines,solutions%20to%20high%20housing%20costs.\">NPR One\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://tun.in/pj2qf\">TuneIn\u003c/a> or on your favorite podcast listening app.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"excerpt": "The highest rate of evictions in the Bay Area is not in San Francisco or Oakland, but the working-class suburb of Antioch, where the number of Black and Brown residents has spiked in recent years.",
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"title": "A Suburb With an Eviction Problem | KQED",
"description": "The highest rate of evictions in the Bay Area is not in San Francisco or Oakland, but the working-class suburb of Antioch, where the number of Black and Brown residents has spiked in recent years.",
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"headline": "A Suburb With an Eviction Problem",
"datePublished": "2022-02-14T11:37:34-08:00",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>The place with the highest rate of evictions in the Bay Area during the pandemic wasn’t a big city like Oakland or San Francisco — instead it was a suburb that has been radically transformed by housing crisis after housing crisis. Antioch, a working-class town on the outskirts of the Bay, has seen an influx of Black and Brown folks pushed from more expensive cities in search of a place they can afford.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In our first episode of Season 2 of Sold Out, we visit a neighborhood in Antioch with a high concentration of evictions. We’ll hear from renters, activists and politicians to find out how a lack of affordable housing is remaking the suburbs, not just in the Bay Area but across the country.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch5 id=\"embed-code\" class=\"inconsolata\">\n\u003c!-- iframe plugin v.4.3 wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/ -->\u003cbr>\n\u003ciframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https://playlist.megaphone.fm?e=KQINC4565731200&light=true\" width=\"100%\" class=\"iframe-class\">\u003c/iframe>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/h5>\n\u003chr>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cstrong>Evicted: A Suburban Story [TRANSCRIPT] \u003c/strong>\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Hey, I’m \u003cb>Erin Baldassari (host)\u003c/b>.\u003cb>\u003cbr>\n\u003c/b>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And I’m \u003c/span>\u003cb>Molly Solomon (host)\u003c/b>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We want to take you back in time — two years ago — to the beginning of the pandemic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: We were all told to shelter in place. And as housing reporters, our first thought — how will people pay rent? \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: We heard from a lot of people who lost jobs, or had hours cut.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>LAURA YOPIHUA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t know what to do after that without job, without income.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People were forced to make really difficult decisions. Like choosing between buying groceries or paying rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>LAURA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t have any money to pay the bills. I just have saving the money for the food. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we heard from people afraid they’d end up on the streets.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE LOWERY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s just really scary right now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Entire families were at risk. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I have to have a roof over my head. You know, I just have to, and of course, my grandbabies and the whole family does.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: Millions across the country were on the edge of eviction. The stakes could not have been higher. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>SAN FRANCISCO CITY ATTORNEY DAVID CHIU\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If tens of thousands of folks are forced from their homes, COVID will be much more likely to spread and have devastating consequences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: States, local governments, even the CDC knew they had to act — so they put in moratoriums to block evictions. And Congress handed out nearly $50 billion to help people catch up on missed rent.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If we don’t act now, there could be a wave of evictions and foreclosures in the coming months.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">: But people were\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">still being evicted.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JANEE BRICE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The sheriff came out, and I ended up having to move with my daughter. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">:\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And now, as those pandemic protections expire — it’s getting worse.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song begins.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In this season of Sold Out, we’re looking at the patterns of evictions. The ones in the headlines, and the ones that have quietly devastated lives for decades.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The more we looked at who is getting evicted and where, it became clear that evictions are a symptom of a larger problem. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Over the next few weeks, we’ll show you how this problem sits at the crossroads of inequality, racism, power and privilege.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And we’ll introduce you to the people fighting for change.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">From KQED, this is \u003c/span>Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Stay tuned.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sold Out theme song ends.)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11839127\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 657px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-11839127\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"657\" height=\"337\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336.png 657w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2020/09/SOLD-OUT-Web-Banners__Tune-In_656x336-160x82.png 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 657px) 100vw, 657px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">KQED’s podcast Sold Out looks at the history of and solutions to California’s housing crisis. \u003ccite>(KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: Birds, sprinklers on lawns, light happy music)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When most people think about the suburbs, they think about good schools and safe neighborhoods, single-family houses with manicured lawns, and white picket fences.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tamisha Torres-Walker wanted that for her family. She’d rented her whole life, and was ready to buy a place where she could raise her two sons. When she looked around, she found that most parts of the San Francisco Bay Area were too expensive. But not Antioch.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA TORRES-WALKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch just showed up as like this place that was still affordable for people who wanted to become first-time homebuyers. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Even though the place she found wasn’t her dream house, it checked a lot of boxes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The house picked me. It was like it had everything a single mom with two sons could need. We needed three bedrooms: It had it. I wanted a fireplace: It had it. My sons wanted dogs: It had a huge backyard.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In 2015, Tamisha bought her first home. But living in Antioch, she noticed a lot of other newcomers weren’t buying homes — they were renting. They’d been priced out of bigger cities, like San Francisco and Oakland.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The rental crisis, the unaffordability of, like, rents skyrocketing in the Bay Area is what started to push everybody else out this way.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Tamisha isn’t just a homeowner. She’s a city council member, has been for the last year. So we asked her to show us around.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch is home to more than 115,000 people. It’s a commuter town on the outer fringes of the Bay Area, about an hour’s drive from San Francisco. Highway 4 divides it in two.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’re like right up against Highway 4 right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> On one side of the highway, there are rows and rows of single-family homes, peppered with strip malls, big box stores and a golf course. On the other side, there’s Tamisha’s district.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s a huge district — stretching about 15 miles along the San Joaquin River Delta. There’s a quaint, historic downtown, and a lot of industry. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out) \u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As we drive along the waterfront, she points out paper mills, chemical plants and oil refineries. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of people call it “Refinery Row.”\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Her district is also where a lot the apartment buildings and townhomes are. Especially in this one neighborhood — the Sycamore Corridor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is us, Sycamore Square, and a lot more apartments.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> On the neighborhood’s busiest street, there’s a small shopping center, with a liquor store, a smoke shop, and a fried fish and chicken joint.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So this, all of this, is high-density housing. Like, everything on this side of the street is all high-density housing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We came here because we’d been gathering data on pandemic evictions in the Bay Area. And when we crunched the numbers, Antioch stood out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was the city with the highest eviction rate\u003c/span>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> —\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> 22 times higher than in Oakland. Almost a year and a half into the pandemic, there had been 91 evictions in Antioch. In Oakland, a city four times bigger, there had been just 33. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://evictions.study/\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-11904602 size-medium\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-800x394.png\" alt=\"A map showing the number of evictions in East Bay Area cities, California, shaded in different colors to show lower and higher numbers.\" width=\"800\" height=\"394\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-800x394.png 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-1020x503.png 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM-160x79.png 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/Screen-Shot-2022-02-09-at-9.53.34-AM.png 1448w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> But it’s important to note that our data only captures evictions enforced by the sheriff. And many people leave before that point, so we know even more people were evicted during that time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I thought that we were not supposed to be evicting people during a global pandemic.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The highest concentration of evictions in Antioch was right here in the Sycamore Corridor, and we saw clear signs of that as we drove around. As we turned one corner, we saw two houses with big piles of stuff on the front lawn. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s probably somebody being put out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> All of that stuff outside?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s probably somebody being put out. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was furniture, kids’ toys, cardboard boxes with papers and letters spilling out of them — all of it wet. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Today’s the sixth. So that means that if you got a three-day ‘pay or quit’ on the first?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You might be out now. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You might be out now, yeah. People might be starting to leave right now, yeah. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A couple doors down, there was another empty house. The neighbors said the family had left months ago. An eviction notice was still taped to the front door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Talking to people in Tamisha’s district, it seemed like everyone had an eviction story. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>NATE HAYES\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They gave us a notice, and we didn’t really know what to do, so we just moved. I’ve been staying with my friends mostly. Just staying with my friends, and trying to get by.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>DEVIN URBACH\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> You know, it’s been so hard to get help. You have to really, like, know somebody that knows somebody. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MARY ROBERTSON\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> It’s not easy after you have an eviction. It’s not easy finding another place. It’s not easy.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">This is not the vision of the suburbs we thought we knew. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS SCHILDT\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We’ve had this story that’s been told to us, that the suburbs is the place of white picket fences. And that has been true, but it’s never been the entire story.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/schildtchris\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Chris Schildt\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. She’s the director of the Regional Suburban Organizing Project. And she says, this idea that suburbs represent white middle-class success, that’s not really the case anymore. Across the country, suburbs are home to the largest and fastest-growing population of people living in poverty. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.brookings.edu/book/confronting-suburban-poverty-in-america/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s according to research from the Brookings Institution.\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We can’t deny there are more people of color living in the suburbs. There are more low-income people living in suburbs. There are more renters living in suburbs than ever before.\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">So we need to look at and understand what’s happening in suburban places like Antioch in order to understand what’s happening in this country.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> The evictions we’re seeing in Antioch are tied to the nation’s housing crisis, and the seeds of those evictions were planted 30 years ago.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> In the early ’90s, Antioch was a destination. There was a building boom going on, and a lot of middle-class people of color were moving in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A lot of Latinx and African American folks who had moved out to buy a home, maybe to buy their first home, or to move into a bigger or better home from where they were living before. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Michael Carter grew up in East Oakland, a historically Black neighborhood. He’s an investment banker, and in the early ’90s, he wanted a safer place to raise his two sons. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL CARTER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Seeing how Oakland was beginning to change and the amount of crime that I was beginning to notice, I didn’t want my boys growing up in that area.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">He saw opportunity in Antioch. He found a really nice four-bedroom home for less than $150,000. It was in one of the fancier parts of town, out by a golf course.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That wasn’t going to happen in Oakland, no way.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Michael and his family were part of this wave of Black families moving to Antioch. It was a big shift for the city. In 1980, Antioch was almost \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/cities/Antioch70.htm\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">90% white\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, and it had a history as a sundown town. There had actually been laws in place to prohibit people of color from walking the streets after dark. Even after those laws were repealed, some people of color told us they still didn’t feel safe.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But between 1990 and 2000, the city’s Black population \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"http://www.bayareacensus.ca.gov/cities/Antioch70.htm\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">more than quadrupled\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">, rising to almost 10% of the population. The Latino population doubled.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were actually seeing a diverse demographic moving to Antioch.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Then the foreclosure crisis hit, and it hit families like Michael’s especially hard. He ended up losing his home and becoming a renter.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MICHAEL\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">2008 hit and everything just got slammed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Foreclosures tore through low-income suburbs across the country. Again, here’s Chris Schildt: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was specifically low-income suburban cities with large African American, Latinx homeowners of color nationally that had the highest foreclosure rates.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Antioch, a quarter of all homeowners with mortgages lost their homes.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That area was one of the hardest hit in the country for foreclosures. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Chris says that a lot of those homes weren’t bought by new homeowners — they were bought by investors.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And you saw this dramatic shift.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Over the past 20 years, the population in Antioch has continued to grow. But the number of homeowners has stayed relatively flat, even dropping slightly, while the number of renters grew by 60%.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It was a complete flip. It went from being a home-owning community to a renter community in terms of who is moving in.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A big part of that was surging rents in cities like San Francisco and Oakland, pushing renters further and further away in search of any place they could afford. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think Antioch’s story is unique.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music out)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You can see the effects of gentrification in suburbs around Chicago, Atlanta, Boston. Places that were once affordable have gotten more and more expensive. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That is part of a regional trend and part of a national trend of what’s happening in the suburbs.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11616048\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11616048\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2017/09/Antioch_California-800x533.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The suburb of Antioch.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As more low-income renters move out to the suburbs, evictions there are going up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We talked to someone who studies this. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/team/tim-thomas-ph-d/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tim Thomas\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> is the research director at the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.urbandisplacement.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Urban Displacement Project at the University of California in Berkeley\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. And he says he noticed the same trend around Seattle: High prices there pushed people south of the city.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TIM\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There were a lot of Black households, in particular, moving to South King County because that was the last affordable space to be. But now we see that’s the space where most evictions are happening. Over half of the evictions in the whole county are happening in very few neighborhoods where that displacement has happened.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s not a coincidence that evictions are hitting Black neighborhoods the hardest, because evictions and race are deeply connected. When Tim looked at our data on evictions in the Bay Area, he saw that Black households were evicted at a higher rate than white households. It’s the same pattern he saw in Seattle.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TIM\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In just one year of data, I found that Black women were getting evicted seven times more than white women, and Black households in general are getting evicted four times more than white households, which was a huge disparity.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In a lot of ways, the suburbs haven’t caught up to this new reality. They don’t typically have the money or staffing for social services that big cities have. Again, here’s Chris Schildt: \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CHRIS\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We really stopped investing in our suburbs in the ’80s and ’90s. In community infrastructure, in nonprofits and social services, in our schools. We’ve moved away from investing in our communities in general in the past 30, 40 years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> And, suburbs don’t have the kinds of renter protections that big cities have to help people stay in their homes. It leaves renters with few options when things do\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">go wrong. When that eviction notice gets taped to the front door.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s coming up, after this break.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Advertisement]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: People walking, greeting one another)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hi, how are you? I’m Erin. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Hi. Carmen.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hola,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">cómo estás?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Bien, gracias.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We met Carmen Ponce at her apartment in Antioch. It’s a small place on the ground floor of a two-story building. And immediately, when you walk in, you see these boxes: big plastic bins stacked on top of each other, ready in case she needs to leave.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Si miras alrededor de mi apartamento, casi todo ya esta en caja, todo vacío.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Carmen lives here with her teenage daughter and 1-year-old granddaughter. She also has two adult sons who sometimes stay with her. Ever since they got an eviction notice, they’ve been living in this sort of limbo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">The problems with her landlord started when the pandemic shut down businesses like hers. Carmen cuts hair at a barbershop in a town nearby. And because of COVID, she was out of work for almost a year. She fell behind on the $1,300 she pays in rent every month. It was a difficult time.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Pues,\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">fue una temporada bien difícil, de verdad.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> So many people we talked to while reporting on evictions told us they were already struggling to pay rent. And then something else would happen, something that made catching up nearly impossible. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Carmen’s case, she was shot just outside her home, in an incident that had nothing to do with her.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Tengo mi hija que apenas tiene diecisiete años, y que tenía su bebe de un año, que yo me hago responsable de ella. Eso es que hace manternerme fuerte.\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u003cbr>\n\u003c/span>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Carmen spent a month in the hospital and another four months recovering at home. She started working again last July, but it wasn’t full time. Then, things got a lot worse. Her property manager dropped off a notice at her door. It said, pay the back rent or get out. She owed at least $15,000.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">A donde me voy con mi hija y con mi nieta? O sea, la única opción era sacar mis cosas en la calle y dormir en mi carro afuera.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Where would she go with her daughter and granddaughter? She thought their only option would be to stay in her car because she didn’t have enough money to move somewhere else.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">At this point in the pandemic, Carmen was still covered by California’s eviction moratorium. So, rather than leaving right away, she waited. Legally, the landlord would need to file a formal eviction in court to actually force her out. But that lawsuit never came.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">No para el acosto constante del manager. Porque también me hable por telefono, que cuando me voy a ir?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Instead, Carmen says the property manager keeps harassing her, calling her again and again, asking her when she’s going to leave. They even gave her a second eviction notice in January this year, but they still haven’t filed a lawsuit.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>BOB GUNSON\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">There was no harassment, it was just getting her attention.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Bob Gunson is Carmen’s property manager, and he says his office only called to get her signed up for the rent relief program.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>BOB\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s the only reason. And we’ve got quite a few tenants. We’ve got some signed into that program, and they weren’t aware of it, and it’s helped them out a lot.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Carmen did sign up for rent relief. She got a partial payout, but not for everything she owes, and doesn’t know when the rest of the money will come. Work has been slow, and she still isn’t making the same amount she was before the pandemic. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Yo estoy, pues, que no se que va pasar el dia de mañana.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> She says she doesn’t know what’s going to happen from one day to the next. It’s depressing, and Carmen knows there’s lots of people in Antioch going through the same thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CARMEN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Da tristeza, da tristeza en la situación en la que, en lo personal en la que yo me encuentro y en la que mucha gente en Antioch estamos viviendo porque yo se que todavía hay mucha gente que está pasando lo mismo que yo.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_11904499\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 800px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-11904499\" src=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-800x600.jpg\" alt=\"A woman in an apartment room stands to the left of boxes and plastic bins filled with her family's belongings.\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-800x600.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1020x765.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-160x120.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2022/02/IMG_8546-1920x1440.jpg 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Carmen Ponce inside her apartment in Antioch. After the business where she worked closed due to COVID’s effects on the economy, she has most of her belongings in boxes should she ever need to pick up and leave. \u003ccite>(Erin Baldassari, KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> That’s because Antioch is becoming less affordable. During the pandemic, rents here shot up \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/antioch-ca\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">26%\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://bayareaequityatlas.org/indicators/housing-burden#/?breakdown=2&geo=07000000000602252\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Nearly two-thirds of all Antioch renters\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> are cost burdened, meaning they pay more than a third of their income on housing. As housing gets more expensive, it’s harder to hold on to, especially for people living paycheck to paycheck. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That leads to more turnover. People leave, they’re priced out, or they’re evicted. City Councilmember Tamisha Torres-Walker says that churn hurts the whole community.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It creates anxiety, instability, it creates uncertainty, and that’s unfortunate because neighborhoods can’t thrive like that.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s one reason why Tamisha is helping to lead a growing movement of Antioch renters pushing for change — a movement that started in the Sycamore Corridor. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s coming up after this break.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">[Advertisement]\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For a long time after Tamisha Torres-Walker moved to Antioch, it didn’t really feel like home. She was actually thinking about leaving. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And then I started to care about the conditions in the community and actually like being here, and made a bigger commitment to change where I lived. So in a sense, I made a commitment to stay.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And she realized there wasn’t anyone on Antioch’s City Council who she felt really represented her district. So, she decided to run. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> I heard not one elected official talk about the conditions in the community, the real issues and conditions in the community, here in this district.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Tamisha spent countless hours knocking on doors — a lot of it in the Sycamore Corridor. She talked to people, asking them what kinds of issues they were dealing with.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">You know, poverty, harm, violence, police misconduct and brutality, dilapidated conditions, just the quality of life, the way people were living.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And a lot of people were getting evicted. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We were talking to people and they were telling us, ‘Oh, this person, that person next door don’t live here no more. They moved out last week.’ Like literally, like they got kicked out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">One man who would become instrumental in Tamisha’s campaign was Francisco Torres. He’s a tenant organizer for the \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.acceaction.org/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Most people just call it ACCE.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">As more low-income renters moved to suburbs like Antioch, Francisco’s seen the fight for renters’ rights follow close behind. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Because it’s much more expensive now, it’s much more expensive, and there’s less and less places to move into.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">When Francisco heard Tamisha was running for city council, he and other ACCE members jumped in to support her campaign.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And the reason I got involved is because I knew that if Tamisha won, we could change the city council.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Maybe they would actually have a chance of passing policies to help renters. She did win, and that’s when their work really began.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Antioch doesn’t have the history of tenant activism that you see in big cities like San Francisco or Los Angeles. And they knew Tamisha wouldn’t be able to get any new policies passed unless renters spoke up. So ACCE began recruiting.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Sounds: A man knocking on a door)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JAIME CALDER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hello? How are you? My name is Jaime, I’m with ACCE institute.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They got people to write letters to their representatives, hold signs outside of City Hall, and show up on Zoom meetings.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE LOWERY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Hi, can everyone hear me? OK. Good evening, Mayor, city council members, staff and residents of Antioch. My name is Jackie Lowery and I’m a resident of Antioch, a renter, and a member of ACCE.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> The Antioch City Council is now actively debating tenant protections, and renters are\u003c/span> \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">showing up.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACKIE\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">My family and I moved to Antioch for a better life. But from what I’ve been seeing in our city with our tax-paying and rent-paying citizens is shameful. You have a rental community in Antioch that needs your help right now.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CITY COUNCIL SPEAKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Families are struggling to pay their rent, and live with the daily worry if the next rent increase will be what puts them out.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>CITY COUNCIL SPEAKER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Rents are constantly increasing. Many of us are just going back to work because of the pandemic. We simply can’t afford the high rents and don’t see a way forward.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">They’re demanding three big things: a cap on yearly rent increases, a new law to make it illegal for landlords to harass their tenants, and another that makes it harder for landlords to evict. It’s the first time renters are pushing for these kinds of protections in Antioch. And it’s by no means a sure thing.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Lots of people don’t want these policies to pass — landlords and other property owners don’t want more government regulation. Not to mention a couple city council members who are pushing back. There’s more meetings on the books before the council will cast their final votes. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">But no matter what happens with these proposals, Tamisha is hopeful.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ci>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">(Music in)\u003c/span>\u003c/i>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">People are organizing. There are people who are organizing themselves as they’re starting to see that they need to create a voice from the ground. And I think that’s the greatest change any community could see is people building community.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Renters are taking a stand, and fighting to stay in Antioch. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>TAMISHA\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I don’t think that’s happened here in Antioch, especially for people who have transitioned here. And I see it happening now and I’m excited about it.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Some people don’t even realize that you could actually fight in a big group, and win.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">For Francisco and members of ACCE, there’s no fight more important than the fight to stay housed.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>FRANCISCO\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">And it’s important to protect that, because what else do you have if you don’t have a home?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">That’s the question that really got us thinking about evictions in the first place. Because home is the center of our lives, where we can be ourselves. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It shapes our identities and keeps our families safe. And if we suddenly had to leave, we’d feel lost, disconnected. But that’s what happens when you’re evicted — you lose your home, and so much more. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Coming up on \u003c/span>Sold Out:\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> We’ll look at who’s more likely to be on the receiving end of evictions, and how the consequences can follow you for years.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JEAN KENDRICK\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">It’s hard. Not even my worst enemy, I wouldn’t wish this on. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>U.S. REPRESENTATIVE CORI BUSH\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Who speaks for us, and who speaks for single parents? Who speaks for Black women? Who speaks for us?\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>JACOB FABER\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">I would argue that one of the biggest reasons, if not the biggest reason, is this weight of history.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: Sold Out \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">is a production of KQED. This episode was written and reported by us, Erin Baldassari and Molly Solomon.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Adhiti Bandlamudi produced this episode. Kyana Moghadam is our senior producer. Brendan Willard is our sound engineer. Rob Speight wrote our theme song. Natalia Aldana is our senior engagement producer, and Gerald Fermin is our engagement intern.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>MOLLY\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks to our editor, Erika Kelly. Additional editing from Jessica Placzek and Otis Taylor Jr.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">If you liked this episode, we think you’ll like another podcast from KQED, \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/series/american-suburb-podcast/\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">American Suburb\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">. A big thank-you to Sandhya Dirks, whose previous reporting on Antioch really helped guide us.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cb>ERIN\u003c/b>: \u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">We couldn’t have made this season without Ethan Toven-Lindsey, Holly Kernan, Erika Aguilar and Vinnee Tong.\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next week!\u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>For more in-depth reporting on the housing crisis, check out our podcast, Sold Out: Rethinking Housing in America. Subscribe on \u003ca href=\"https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/sold-out-rethinking-housing-in-america/id1531354937?itsct=podcast_box&itscg=30200\">Apple Podcasts\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://open.spotify.com/show/38dTBSk2ISFoPiyYNoKn1X\">Spotify\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"https://www.npr.org/podcasts/911586047/s-o-l-d-o-u-t-rethinking-housing-in-america#:~:text=SOLD%20OUT%3A%20Rethinking%20Housing%20in%20America%20%3A%20NPR&text=SOLD%20OUT%3A%20Rethinking%20Housing%20in%20America%20A%20podcast%20that%20examines,solutions%20to%20high%20housing%20costs.\">NPR One\u003c/a>, \u003ca href=\"http://tun.in/pj2qf\">TuneIn\u003c/a> or on your favorite podcast listening app.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
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"possible": {
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
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},
"radiolab": {
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"info": "A two-time Peabody Award-winner, Radiolab is an investigation told through sounds and stories, and centered around one big idea. In the Radiolab world, information sounds like music and science and culture collide. Hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, the show is designed for listeners who demand skepticism, but appreciate wonder. WNYC Studios is the producer of other leading podcasts including Freakonomics Radio, Death, Sex & Money, On the Media and many more.",
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},
"reveal": {
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"info": "Created by The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, Reveal is public radios first one-hour weekly radio show and podcast dedicated to investigative reporting. Credible, fact based and without a partisan agenda, Reveal combines the power and artistry of driveway moment storytelling with data-rich reporting on critically important issues. The result is stories that inform and inspire, arming our listeners with information to right injustices, hold the powerful accountable and improve lives.Reveal is hosted by Al Letson and showcases the award-winning work of CIR and newsrooms large and small across the nation. In a radio and podcast market crowded with choices, Reveal focuses on important and often surprising stories that illuminate the world for our listeners.",
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"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.revealnews.org/episodes/",
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},
"rightnowish": {
"id": "rightnowish",
"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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},
"science-friday": {
"id": "science-friday",
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"info": "Science Friday is a weekly science talk show, broadcast live over public radio stations nationwide. Each week, the show focuses on science topics that are in the news and tries to bring an educated, balanced discussion to bear on the scientific issues at hand. Panels of expert guests join host Ira Flatow, a veteran science journalist, to discuss science and to take questions from listeners during the call-in portion of the program.",
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