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on top of their living expenses or navigates the court fee waiver process. Then boom, the LL/the eviction attorney request a trial by judge without even reading the tenant response. Had there been no response, the LL and the eviction attorney would have requested a default judgement and the family would have an eviction on their record – and thus would have ended their chance at finding new housing. The court sets a trial date, and the tenant now has to schedule time off work, learn how to navigate current virtual court date technologies, possibly navigate making requests for interpreters for non-native English speakers, and ensure that they don’t miss any notices on top of having to look for a new place to live should the court rule against them. This is not just. Let’s recap: A LL serves a notice with the fake reason. The tenant has nowhere to move to. The eviction attorney isn’t held to any standard except knowing the basic process of how to file forms with the court. The court eviction forms allow for loopholes for eviction cases to proceed in scenarios not related to non-payment of rent while actually being based in non-payment of rent or LL desire to increase rents above and beyond the legal limit. There exists no mechanism for the court to see that any particular landlord is egregiously pursuing evictions on multiple residents (even of the same building in some scenarios) and community members who in many instances have been paying their rents on time for many many years. In one of the cases I worked, the tenants found a new place to live, but it’s not available til mid month July. They informed the LL's eviction attorney who then submitted a stipulation judgement to the court. The court failed to consider how the eviction notice was not only asserting a fake reason of “substantial repairs”, but also that the form UD101 states that the tenant failed to provide a declaration to the landlord of inability to pay rent due to the pandemic (which is abhorrently false and seemingly unrelated to the eviction notice). The tenants did in fact provide the letter to the landlord and management. But the court doesn’t care. The court cares about the fact that the eviction attorney sent a stipulated judgement to the court without the unit address listed of the stipulated judgement and the judge even offers to handwrite it in for this eviction attorney – a supposed professional – as a result of the eviction attorney's own error. The tenants are to move into their new apartment mid-month after forking up far too much of their own savings on top of having remained current on rent all throughout the pandemic. They don’t qualify for any local programs regarding rent relief having paid rent all throughout the pandemic. The stipulated judgement requires they vacate the unit no later than one day after their move-in date of their new apartment – this means they have literally less than 24 hours to get everything out of the old unit and into the new unit. Their new rent is $1800; their old rent was $1400. The LL of the old property has been painting the building and recent postings for the newly vacated units are starting at $1800. The LL has also unnecessarily installed new floors in many units. Neither of these things constitutes substantial repairs – maybe a modest rent increase at most… but not an eviction. The tenants accepted the stipulated judgement and the LL agrees to not pursue damages after they vacate. The tenants are simply happy to move on with their lives and not have an eviction on their record (albeit with one more hearing at the end of the month to prove to the judge that they moved out). Just like the rental units of former tenants in far too many scenarios, the space for the notion that tenants are more than a rent check to a landlord – whether corporate or individual – remains vacant. It’s time for that to change. 2