One strike and out, in public housing

A grandmother who has lived in a public housing project in Oakland, Calif. for 30 years is ordered evicted from her apartment. The action is taken not because the grandmother has done anything wrong.

Instead, she is losing her home because her grandson, unknown to her, smoked marijuana in the complex parking lot.

Barbara Hill is one of four public housing tenants in Oakland who were ordered out of their homes because of someone else's wrongdoing of which they had no knowledge.

Housing authority officials ordered the eviction of Ms. Hill and the others under a law passed by Congress to help fight the war on drugs. It says, in essence, that a tenant in public housing shall be evicted if the tenant, any member of the tenant's household, or any guest engages in drug-related criminal activity on or off the premises.

Today, the US Supreme Court will examine whether such evictions comply with the law as written by Congress, and whether the evictions in any way violate constitutional rights.

"It is a fundamental principle of fairness that our country is built on that you can't be held responsible for the acts of another person," says Anne Tamiko Omura, the Oakland lawyer who took up the four tenants' case.

Lawyers for the Oakland Housing Authority and the Department of Housing and Urban Development counter that there is nothing in the law that requires proof that a tenant had knowledge of others' drug offenses.

"The plain language of (the law) unambiguously authorizes eviction without regard to tenants' knowledge of the drug-related activity of guests," writes US Solicitor General Theodore Olson in his brief to the court.

The law, passed in 1988, is designed to create an incentive for public housing tenants to become foot soldiers in the war on drugs by forcing them to police their own families and guests. Congress noted at the time the law was written that many housing projects suffered from rampant drug-related or violent crime and that in some cases drug dealers were imposing a "reign of terror" on public housing tenants.

"The federal government has a duty to provide public ... housing that is decent, safe, and free from illegal drugs," the Congressional findings say in part.

LAWYERS for the housing authority argue in their brief that public housing is a government benefit that should be given only to drug-free households willing to ensure they don't contribute to illegal drug activity.

"Many drug violators are afoot as guests or household members without the admitted knowledge of the responsible tenants. Yet, such tenants are very much part of the problem," writes Gary LaFayette in his brief filed on behalf of the Oakland Housing Authority. "They are harboring illegal drug activity, even if unwittingly," he says.

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