Merry Xmas Mortimer! Oakland Elders Defeat Landlord in US Supreme Court!

p It is my heartfelt pleasure this holiday season to be the bearer of bad news (likenbsp;POOR Magazinenbsp;povertynbsp;scholar Bad News Bruce)nbsp;to the propertied class--landlords, gentrification agents and their officious appendages of all ages, sizes, occupations and individual degrees of delusion.nbsp; The bad news comes via the US Supreme Court who ruled in favor of elders living in Section 8 housing in Oaklandrsquo;s Park Village Apartmentsmdash;elders who were issued eviction notices.nbsp; The bad news in this article is directed towards Park Village owner Mortimer (Cannbsp;I callnbsp;younbsp;Mo?)nbsp;Howard and for the other Morsquo; Howardrsquo;s of the world.nbsp; Let the bad news keep coming!/p p nbsp;/p p The tenants are an inspiration to a community of mothers, daughters, babies, folks with disabilities and folks of color who are under the constant threat of gentrification, police violence and intentional blighting of their communities.nbsp; It is the place where the media portrays black and brown youth as criminals while, at the same time, portraying agents of the state like Johannes span class="scayt-misspell" data-scayt_word="Mehserle" data-scaytid="1"Mehserle/span as just an honest guy with a lapse of concentration as he failed to differentiate between his gun and span class="scayt-misspell" data-scayt_word="taser" data-scaytid="3"taser/span./p p nbsp;/p p The good news is that a group of section 8 tenantsmdash;mostly eldersmdash;united and thwarted the attempts of the owner to evict them after he opted out of the section 8 program.nbsp; The US Supreme Court upheld an earlier decision that asserted that an owner who opts out of the section 8 programmdash;refusing vouchersmdash;may not evict tenants for non-payment of rent.nbsp;nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p In the case of emMortimer Howard Trust vs. Park Village Apartments/em, the court upheld its February ruling that denied the ownerrsquo;s request to evict the tenants in order to derive higher rents from new tenants.nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p In 2005, after their last government contract expired, the owner sought to leave the section 8 program. nbsp;The request was approved in 2008, whereupon the owner rejected the rental assistance agreements of 15 tenants and filed eviction paperwork.nbsp; US District Judge Sandra Brown blocked the evictions in January 2010mdash;which was upheld by the Ninth US Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco./p p nbsp;/p p The court said that owners have the right to disassociate from section 8, however, a 2000 federal law gives tenants the right to remain in their unitsmdash;providing they pay their rent consistently and not give landlords legitimate reason to evict them./p p nbsp;/p p The elders of the Park Village Apartment tenants Association are heroes, to be respected and honored.nbsp; Theirnbsp;resistance to the egregiousnbsp;debasementnbsp;directed towards them on the part of the landlord wasnbsp;in the spirit of the I-Hotel, where Filipino, Chinese and African Descended elders stood their ground against eviction and displacement before a world stage on the corner of Jackson and Kearny Streets in San Francisco in 1977.nbsp; In that spirit they organized and engendered the help of the National Housing Law Project and Bay Area Legal Aid.nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p As the people chanted 30 years ago: Long Live the I-Hotel!nbsp; We now chant: Long Live the Park Village Tenants Association!nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p Merry Xmas Mortimer!/p p nbsp;/p p God is good./p p nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p p nbsp;/p