Meredith lived in fear of her abusive boyfriend. Earlier this year, she finally found the courage to call the police during an attack at their Brighton apartment. He was arrested and she was treated for severe head trauma. Meredith obtained a restraining order, preventing him from returning to the apartment and barring him from further abuse.
She thought it was safe to begin the hard work of healing the physical and emotional wounds left by her abusive partner. Meredith never expected that the safety of her housing would be threatened because of her experience of abuse.
Shortly after the incident, Meredith received notice that her landlord planned to evict her because of the disruption to other tenants caused by the abuse and police activity in her apartment. Even though Meredith was the victim, and she had obtained an order to keep the perpetrator away from her apartment, she was the one penalized by her landlord and on the verge of homelessness as a result of the domestic violence. She was shocked and scared and she reached out to HomeStart for help. Meredith isn’t alone.
HomeStart has been fighting homelessness in the greater Boston area since 1994. We are often able to serve tenants on the verge of eviction, breaking the cycle by stopping homelessness before it starts.
However, in Meredith’s case, there are no Massachusetts laws that protect tenants from being evicted for reasons related to being a victim of domestic violence. The best we could do for her was to provide information about how to access shelter before she was forced on to the street by her landlord’s eviction. Sixty-three percent of homeless women in Massachusetts are victims of intimate partner violence, according to a six-year National Center on Family Homelessness study.
A bill pending on Beacon Hill — An Act Providing Housing Rights for Victims of Domestic Violence, Rape, Sexual Assault and Stalking, sponsored by Sen. Cynthia Creem and Rep. Ellen Story — should be passed by the Legislature.
The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is a federal law which now allows victims to break leases if they must for safety reasons, and also protects victims from evictions brought against them because of violence and disturbances perpetrated by their abusers. However, VAWA only applies to tenants who happen to reside in certain types of federally subsidized housing. These protections should be extended to all tenants in Massachusetts, regardless of whether they are in public, private market or state-subsidized housing, which is what this bill will do.
Freedom from domestic violence, rape, sexual assault and stalking are basic human rights and these acts of violence remain a public health crisis in the commonwealth. Our institutions must work constantly to keep pace with its prevalence, and develop effective responses.
A surefire way to minimize the deeply damaging impact of domestic violence is to protect victims and their families from homelessness.
This bill would help us accomplish our shared mission of making safety and housing stability a reality for all tenants in the commonwealth. It would have kept Meredith, and scores of others, from becoming homeless.
Julia Devanthery is manager of legal advocacy at HomeStart, a nonprofit whose mission is to end and prevent homelessness in Greater Boston. As You Were Saying is a Herald feature. Readers may submit columns of 600 words. Submissions are subject to editing and become Herald property. Email to oped@bostonherald.com.