LEGAL RESOURCES FOR RENTERS

IN BALTIMORE CITY

Are you facing eviction?

Is the landlord threatening you with illegal fees or refusing to fix major problems with your home?

Are you in subsidized housing and need your rent reduced because of a loss of income?

Is your landlord unlicensed?

For Legal Resources, Click here.

What are Tenant’s Rights in Baltimore City during COVID?

Limited Eviction Moratorium for Renters:

Learn more here.

These  counties ARE covered: Anne Arundel, Baltimore City, Calvert, Caroline, Charles, Dorchester, Cecil, Frederick, Harford, Prince George’s, St. Mary’s, Wicomico, and Worcester.

Questions?

Call 410-396-5555 or

email the City's Eviction Prevention staff

 

List of Maryland Rent Relief Programs.

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Maryland Courts info for renters and landlords.

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Consumer Financial Protection Bureau new tool: 

www.consumerfinance.gov/renthelp.

REVIEW OF A BOOK ABOUT BLACK RECONSTRUCTION IN BALTIMORE

A Brotherhood of Liberty: Black Reconstruction and Its Legacies in Baltimore, 1865-1920 (America in the Nineteenth Century) 

by Dennis Patrick Halpin 

University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019. 248 pages. Hardcover. $39.95.

The author argues that Baltimore is key to understanding the trajectory of civil rights in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. 

In the 1870s and early 1880s, a group of black political leaders moved to Baltimore from rural Virginia and Maryland. Mainly former slaves who had trained in the ministry, they pushed Baltimore toward  Reconstruction's promise of racial equality. In this effort, they were among African Americans then trying to strengthen the Black community and build political muscle by starting churches and businesses, establishing community centers, and founding newspapers. 

In Baltimore, the Black advocates successfully challenged Jim Crow regulations on public transit, in the courts, in the voting booth, and in some residential neighborhoods. They also formed some of the US' earliest civil rights organizations, such as the United Mutual Brotherhood of Liberty, to work for rights after the Civil War.

In the book, it is shown how the strides of black Baltimoreans stimulated segregationists to revise and update their tactics. Segregationists fought Black activists' achievements by using Progressive Era concerns over the need for urban order and corruption to criminalize and disenfranchise Blacks. The author argues the Progressive Era was extremely important in establishing the segregated, racist twentieth-century nation. 

The book also highlights the strategies that can continue to be useful as well as the challenges that are present.

 Baltimore Builds Workshop About Development Financing & Homeownership Program Resources

Baltimore Builds Workshop: Development Financing & Homeownership Program Resources 07/30/2021 Register at https://bit.ly/bmorebuildsaugust21. ***** Source: City of Baltimore Daily Digest Bulletin, July 30, 2021.

 

Maryland Celebrates the 31st Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

DRM Celebrates the 31st Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) Photo from Disabled and Here On the 31st anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), Disability Rights Maryland (DRM) salutes its community, partners, and friends who were instrumental in forging and implementing this landmark legislation for people with disabilities. We are singularly proud of our accomplishments over the past year to actualize the principles of the ADA in Maryland, which include: Prevented proposed budget cuts that would have eliminated 25% of existing bus routes, jeopardizing paratransit services to critical destinations including dialysis centers, mental health programs, occupational and physical therapy providers for over 30,000 paratransit riders, in collaboration with Consumers for Accessible Ride Services (CARS) and other advocates. Achieved changes in subsidized housing operations of a large public housing agency to fund the creation of accessible, affordable rental housing. Brought legal action against a major municipal jurisdiction in Maryland to obtain compliance for substantial ADA violations in maintaining curb ramps and sidewalks, with co-counsel, the Civil Rights Education and Enforcement Center (CREEC), Disability Rights Advocates (DRA) and Goldstein, Borgen, Dardarian & Ho (GBDH). Click here to read about these and other legal victories of this past year >> July has been named Disability Culture and Achievements Month in the state of Maryland! Throughout July, Maryland will celebrate the "societal achievements and cultural contributions of Marylanders with disabilities." Click here to read more about Governor Hogan's executive order>> www.DisabilityRightsMD.org  ‌  ‌  ‌  ‌  ‌ ***** Source: Disability Rights Maryland email, July 29, 2021.

COMMUNITY LAW CENTER HOLDS VIRTUAL WORKSHOP ON ZONING LAW

Zoning 101 for Communities: A Virtual Workshop Watch Video On Demand By August 31, 2021 Community leaders are sometimes caught unprepared for zoning hearings - instead, learn how to build the strongest possible case! This 2-hour webinar, which took place in the spring of 2021, covers the basics of zoning law, including conditional uses, variances, and how to research properties in your neighborhood. You'll learn how to build the strongest possible case before the Board of Municipal and Zoning Appeals (BMZA). Applying for a Zoning permit in Baltimore City is a three-part process. Even if your Zoning Permit request is denied, you can file a request for the Board to clarify or reconsider its decision. We'll show you how! Location: Online. Cost: $40. Accessing the webinar: Registration will include a link to access the password-protected Zoom webinar, which you can watch anytime. You will receive the link to the event content in your order confirmation email. Registration Instructions: Register below anytime before August 31, 2021. You will be able to view the webinar anytime at your convenience.

Register

 

Support the #HoUSed Campaign Priorities in the Spending Package

Take Action: Urge Your Senators and Representatives Congressional leaders are working to advance a comprehensive infrastructure and economic recovery package that must include significant investments in affordable housing for America’s lowest-income and most marginalized renters. Key decisions about the package – including how much to invest in affordable housing – are being made right now! We need your help to ensure that any infrastructure and economic recovery package includes the HoUSed campaign’s top priorities: expanding rental assistance to every eligible household, providing at least $70 billion to repair and preserve public housing, and investing at least $45 billion in the national Housing Trust Fund. We also need your help to build congressional support for two major #HoUSed campaign bills – “Housing is Infrastructure Act” (H.R. 4497) and the “Ending Homelessness Act” (H.R. 4496). Together, these bills from House Financial Services Committee Chair Maxine Waters (D-CA) would ensure everyone has a safe, decent, affordable, and accessible place to call home and should be included in the spending bill. Background Now is the time to ensure that any infrastructure and economic recovery package includes the highest allocation possible for housing investments for America’s lowest-income and most marginalized households. Congressional leaders are expected to release in the coming days a budget resolution outlining the topline spending amounts for an infrastructure package and economic recovery package, as well as allocations for housing investments. Once the budget resolution is approved by Congress, each committee – including the Senate Banking Committee and House Financial Services Committee – will draft legislation to divvy up its allocation among various programs. House Financial Services Committee Chair Maxine Waters (D-CA) has introduced two major bills to advance the #HoUSed campaign’s policy agenda – through the infrastructure and economic recovery package and beyond. Chair Waters’s “Housing is Infrastructure Act” would provide $600 billion in housing investments in any infrastructure package. The bill provides robust funding for HoUSed campaign’s top priorities, including $200 billion for rental assistance, $75 billion to repair and preserve public housing, and $45 billion to build homes affordable to people with the lowest incomes through the national Housing Trust Fund.Chair Waters’s “Ending Homelessness Act” would create a universal rental assistance program – a key pillar of the #HoUSed campaign’s legislative agenda. Funding for rental assistance would be mandatory and phased in over ten years to ensure every eligible household receives a housing voucher. If enacted, the bill would help ensure everyone has a safe, decent, affordable, and accessible place to call home. Take Action It is critical that Congress hears from you! Contact your senators and representatives and demand that any infrastructure and economic recovery package include the HoUSed campaign’s top priorities: a major expansion of rental assistance to every eligible household, at least $70 billion to repair and preserve public housing, and at least $45 billion for the national Housing Trust Fund to build homes for those most in need. Urge your members of Congress to cosponsor Chair Waters’s “Housing is Infrastructure Act” (H.R. 4497) and “Ending Homelessness Act” (H.R. 4496). Together these bills would help ensure everyone has a safe, decent, affordable, and accessible place to call home. Learn how to contact your members of Congress at: https://www.govtrack.us/ Find out how to contact your member of Congress Thank you for your advocacy! ***** Source: National Low Income Housing Coalition email, July 28, 2021.

 CELEBRATION OF THE AMERICAN WITH DISABILITIES ACT

July 27, 2021

Maryland Commission on Civil Rights Statement Celebrating The Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act During this month of Americans with Disabilities awareness, the Board of the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights celebrates all persons with visible and invisible disabilities. Since its enactment on July 26, 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act, as amended, and its state-based equivalent statutory protections have provided protections for disability access and inclusion, prohibiting discrimination on the basis of disability in employment, in public accommodation, in public services, in transportation, and in telecommunications. Former President George H. W. Bush called the Act “a new birth of freedom” for Americans who identify as having a disability. This landmark civil rights law has changed society from benevolence towards disability to acceptance. Yet copious work remains. Maryland protects people with disabilities both in Title 20, State Government Article, and in Sections 7-701 to 7-710, Human Services Title. While these laws provide protections, they must be enforced and awareness must continue to be raised to promote equitable access and acceptance of persons with disabilities. The recent litigation in Baltimore City, Maryland, asserting a lack of curb ramps and sidewalk maintenance in violation of federal accessibility requirements shows the ongoing need for diligence in promoting compliance with existing laws. According to the 2018 Disability Status Report, the most recent available, the prevalence of Marylanders with a disability was 11.2% overall, increasing from 5.2% in children between the ages of 5 to 15 to 43.8 percent for persons ages 75 and over. One area in which persons with disabilities experience discrimination includes seeking and obtaining accessible and equitable housing. On July 28, 2021, at 10:00 a.m. the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights will be hosting an event titled “Fair Housing: Know Your Rights” – a workshop to provide information on the laws under the Fair Housing Act, which provides protections that exist for all Marylanders. This event will include an emphasis on disabilities as it relates to housing. You can register for this free event here. Finally, the Commission looks forward to working the Maryland Commission on Disabilities, an advisory body, as well as with the Maryland Department of Disabilities to promote equitable housing and employment for Marylanders with disabilities.

Victim of Discrimination? Training & Partnerships

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Source: Maryland Commission on Civil Rights release, July 27, 2021.