Judge Throws Up Roadblock To Immediate Evictions in NO
By ALAN SAYRE
10/24/2005, 2:29 p.m. CT
The Associated Press
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — With thousands of New Orleans residents facing possible eviction, a judge on Monday temporarily blocked landlords from forcing out tenants unless hearings are held close to home.
Acting on a suit filed by community activist groups, Orleans Parish Civil District Judge Kern Reese issued a temporary order blocking eviction hearings from taking place at the New Orleans' post-hurricane court headquarters in Gonzales, roughly 60 miles west of the city.
The suit contends state law and the Louisiana Constitution require eviction hearings to be held in New Orleans — and any such proceedings conducted in another parish would be illegal.
"They are going to have to physically move the eviction hearings back to New Orleans" from Gonzales, where they now would be held because of the court's relocation, said attorney Bill Quigley of the Loyola University law school, who filed the suit in Gonzales.
Although the suit hedges on legal procedure, it says many renters are being denied their right to due process because it would be impossible for them to defend themselves in a court 58 miles from New Orleans.
Reese, who set a Nov. 2 hearing on whether to make his order permanent, said eviction proceedings could be held in a city court in nearby Algiers that was not affected by flooding from Hurricane Katrina. The suit said thousands of renters do not have personal transportation from New Orleans to Gonzales.
"Forcing people who are already at a severe disadvantage due to the hurricanes and floods to find some way to travel several parishes away to defend their rights to shelter is a clear and violation of the fundamental guarantee of fairness that is contained in the right to due process," the suit said.
The court is operating in Ascension Parish under an order issued by the Louisiana Supreme Court shortly after Katrina blitzed the city.
Landlords in the New Orleans area have been filing eviction suits, saying they have thousands of apartments that could help remedy a severe housing shortage cited as a major obstacle to getting employee-hungry businesses running. Many tenants who fled the region have not contacted their landlords.
At the same time, some residents say they've returned to their rented dwellings to find that landlords have thrown out personal belongings as trash.
Gizelle Smith, the lead plaintiff in the suit, said she received an eviction notice for not paying her $295 rent for September. Smith, a parking lot attendant and a single mother of three, has only been able to pay half of a $690 bill for September and October rent and late fees. She's lived in her central city residence, which sustained mold and roof damage from Katrina, for 11 years.
"After 11 years, they should have given me a break," she said.
The suit would only cover evictions in New Orleans and not in its sprawling suburbs.
On Sept. 6, Gov. Kathleen Blanco banned landlords from evicting renters in Katrina's wake, but later lifted that order, effective Tuesday, for southeastern Louisiana. A ban remains in effect until Nov. 25 in western parts of Louisiana hit by Hurricane Rita.
The National Apartment Association had pushed for an end to the eviction ban, saying it would help rehabilitate property, provide homes for workers and help with the city's economic recovery.
NAA Executive Vice President Doug Culkin, who visited New Orleans last week, said Tuesday that he hoped the suit "is not going to delay repairing those apartments and getting people back into them." Neither the NAA nor any landlords are defendants in the suit, which was filed against the New Orleans court system.