[ Golden Gater Online - October 14, 1997 ]
by Bernadette Smith
Staff writer
SF State students will receive free tenancy counseling on campus from a project which pairs on-campus groups with off-campus legal services.
The program is a joint effort between the Students for Safe and Stable Homes, a campus-based advocacy group that concentrates on poverty and homelessness issues, and the Legal Resource Center, an on-campus counseling service which has an in-house attorney and "has been giving tenancy rights advice all along," said Karen Gabai, co-director of the center. Also, the San Francisco Tenants Union will provide student volunteers with training from longtime attorneys and tenant rights counselors.
"It's a landlord's market, and it's particularly difficult for students who rent and even harder for those who don't know their rights," said Ted Gullicksen, a representative from the tenants union.
A vacancy rate of 4 percent constitutes a housing emergency and currently the city's rate is below 1 percent .
Volunteers will be trained during two classes held Oct. 25 and Nov. 1 at 10 a.m. The volunteers will then be placed with experienced counselors to complete their training until they are given their own counseling shifts in mid-November.
The volunteers will be given specialized training that focuses on tenant rights, rather than the broad training that the legal resource counselors receive, according to Mike Ilich, a political science major who is organizing the on-campus couseling for Students for Safe and Stable Homes. Volunteers may be able to receive credit for their services next semester, but Ilich said he is unsure how such credit would be given.
Students who seek advice from the on-campus counselors will receive membership in the union, the Tenants Rights Handbook and a newsletter. The union usually charges $10 per visit or a $30 annual membership fee for tenant counseling, but these services will be free to SF State students.
Counselors will be available one day per week or by appointment and will "provide students that come in the knowledge to help themselves," said Ilich.
Abbie Conner, a business major, turned to the union after her apartment was damaged in a fire in December.
"We didn't move back in completely until March, and it would have been longer if we hadn't gotten advice from the union. Their booklet helped us know where we stood legally."
In addition to soliciting volunteer counselors, Ilich's advocacy group is currently holding monthly forums to discuss the low vacancy rate and how it affects students. The group has discussed the possibility of lobbying to demand that action be taken to make Verducci Hall available to students as housing. The vacant dormitory building was damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and has never been repaired.
The group will also be sponsoring the Bay Area Student Conference on Homelessness and Poverty on Nov. 8, which will incorporate speeches, workshops and interactive games focusing on how students can become involved in the issues through organized activism.
The tenants union was established in 1970 by a group of SF State students in the Haight district, which had a large student community at the time. Today, the union is located in the Mission and its hours vary depending on the availability of its volunteers.
The union already counsels students but their location and fee are barriers to many, according to Gullicksen.
"When I moved out of my apartment on Turk Street," said Dave Carter, a senior in bio-chemistry, "my realty company took $400 out of the security deposit because they pro-rated the rent two weeks."
He added, "Having a service on campus would have helped me fight for that money because for a student, $400 is a lot of money."
[ Golden Gater - October 14, 1997 ]