We were almost homeless after the unexpected hit. It’s why I back Tacoma Initiative 1 | Opinion

Between rising rents and inflation, times have never been harder for tenants in Tacoma, but Initiative 1 will bring critical protections to renters.

My own recent story illustrates how this measure will keep families together and off the streets.

In July 2022, the medical office my husband Kevin worked at closed due to the doctor’s retirement. He wasn’t eligible for unemployment due to a decade-old dispute with the state about a previous unemployment claim.

Kevin took a minimum-wage job and while I worked as a substitute teacher for Tacoma Public Schools, but without Kevin’s historically higher income, we were struggling financially. We missed our August installment of a rent repayment plan, which was required under Washington law at the time, triggering a period of intense fear as we waited for the sheriff to knock at our door and throw us out into the street.

After making calls to all the shelters in town, we quickly learned there were no family shelter spaces available, so we would be separated. Our beloved cats would have to be surrendered to the Humane Society, and we would lose most of our belongings. It was truly a nightmare scenario, and my heart was breaking for our 14-year-old son and the trauma he was about to face.

Ironically, because the school year started I was now working again as a substitute teacher, and Kevin had just landed a great job at another medical office. We had finally resolved our income issues, but the property manager refused to give us a second chance to allow us to resume our repayment plan and our eviction was set to move forward.

It appeared our family would be destroyed by these circumstances until Tacoma For All organizers intervened. They held a protest at our apartment complex that drew a significant crowd and garnered media attention and launched a GoFundMe campaign that reached nearly $13,000 in donations. Tacoma For All organizer and attorney Beverly Allen also stepped forward to represent us pro bono and brought a powerful legal defense in court. Between the public pressure and the court battle, our landlords decided to settle, and we reached an agreement that pays back all our owed rent and will ensure my family remains housed.

It’s terrifying how one stretch of financial hardship can put a family on a path that leads to eviction, homelessness, separation and destruction, from which many families will never recover. Evictions bring serious long-term consequences, including being almost automatically denied for future rental units, a negative impact on credit scores and reduced purchasing power and even CPS scrutiny that can result in children being removed from the family and entering the foster system.

Pierce County has led the state in evictions in recent years and families like mine are being destroyed as a result.

Opponents of Initiative 1 claim that it will lead to unexpected costs for taxpayers and new city bureaucracy, but this isn’t true, as Tacoma for All has documented on its blog. Instead, the initiative provides incentives in the form of legal fees for attorneys to pursue landlords who choose to violate the provisions. This isn’t likely to apply to very many landlords, as the initiative creates only a few new requirements including six months’ notice of any rent increase (current law requires four months), no winter evictions unless the landlord seeks an exception from the court-based on financial hardship, and mandatory relocation assistance if landlords increase rent over 5% in a six-month period.

Landlords can avoid the requirement to pay relocation assistance by limiting rent increases to just under five percent every six months.

Families like mine deserve the chance to get back on track and repay our rent, and Initiative 1 would make landlords more likely to work with us. The initiative contains a provision that revokes the winter eviction protections for tenants who are harassing their neighbors or engaged in illegal business activity, so renters who threaten others or engage in crime can still be evicted at any time during the year.

Initiative 1 also allows for landlords to ask the court for a hardship exemption, so if the rental owner is truly at risk of defaulting on their mortgage, they can seek an order allowing them to proceed with a winter eviction. In my case, like many Tacoma tenants, my apartment is owned by a private equity firm based in San Francisco that claims to be worth over $6 billion. I doubt they would be able to prove financial hardship to the court.

Initiative 1 would have saved my family and given us a second chance, if it was already enacted. Instead, we were saved by the organizers of Tacoma For All.

In order to protect others facing similar circumstances, we need bold and common sense tenant protections to combat rising homelessness, increasing rents, inflation and generally more difficult times.

I urge all Tacoma residents to join me in voting yes on Initiative 1.

This story was originally published November 2, 2023 at 5:00 AM.