LCBH News

Welcome to LCBH’s Blog. Our blog delivers original articles written by our staff, interns and volunteers. We strive to provide informative stories about the work we do on behalf of Chicago renters and the issues renters face.

Hearts for Housing - Thank You!

May 26, 2015 posted in LCBH News

LCBH would like to thank everyone who attended our tenth Annual Hearts for Housing Fundraiser on April 24th. It was great fun to spend the evening playing cards, eating, drinking, and networking with YOU to support a great cause!

Your generosity along with many other individuals, sponsors, and local businesses made Hearts for Housing 2015 a smashing success. Thank you!

LCBH was able to raise over $100,000 to support programs that provide legal and supportive services impacting over 10,000 lower income renters a year. Every one of us has something to contribute to keeping Chicago vibrant and affordable for all of us because we all deserve a safe, decent and affordable place to call home.

We owe a special thanks to LCBH Board of Directors and the Young Professionals Board for their extraordinary efforts in making this raffle and auction a great success! It is truly amazing what can be accomplished when people come together to improve our community!

Thank you for attending this special event and for your support. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!

Congrats to Annemarie, Jim, Steve, and Bert our Hearts for Housing 2015 Tournament Winners!

Again, thank you for your continued support of LCBH’s mission. We look forward to seeing you at future events!

Photos from the event

Young Professionals Board Spotlight

Q & A with Jessica Panza

May 26, 2015 posted in Pro Bono, LCBH News

Young Professionals Board President, Jessica Panza

LCBH’s Young Professionals Board (YPB) began in 2010. The YPB has played a very important role in Hearts for Housing – acquiring raffle prizes, selling raffle and event tickets, and volunteering during this popular LCBH annual event. On the heels of celebrating the tenth annual Hearts for Housing, we thought we would introduce you to YPB President, Jessica Panza. Thank you, Jessica, for all that you do for LCBH. Your enthusiasm is infectious!

How did you first get involved with Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing?
Claire Battle, LCBH Board Secretary, introduced me to LCBH several years ago, when we were both starting our careers as attorneys. She had been involved for quite some time and her enthusiasm for the organization spurred my involvement. As I learned about LCBH's mission, the real need for LCHB's services in our community, and lack of other similar resources, I better understood Claire's passion for LCBH and jumped at the opportunity to get involved with the formation of the Young Professional's Board.

Thank You to our Raffle Prize Donors

May 22, 2015 posted in LCBH News

For 10 years, Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing has counted on generous donations from local businesses, corporations, firms and individuals, providing a wonderful variety of exciting raffle prizes for the Hearts for Housing raffle. This partnership invests in our community, and helps ensure that lower-income renters receive free quality legal and supportive services that, in many cases, can prevent homelessness. With our partners’ help, LCBH advocates for the rights of all renters. We could not do what we do without the generous support of a caring community. Thank you to the veteran, and new, raffle prize donors who believe in LCBH’s mission. Everyone in Chicago deserves a safe, decent and affordable place to call home.

Fellow Spotlight: Jordan Carey

April 16, 2015 posted in LCBH News

Since 2008, Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing (LCBH) awards the Edwin J. Brach and Hazel Bertram Brodie Fellowship to a recent law school graduate who has shown a commitment to LCBH's mission of promoting the rights of tenants to safe, decent, and accessible affordable housing. The legal fellowship supports a law student or recent law graduate in service to low-income tenants. We are proud to announce that the 2015 recipient of this fellowship is Jordan Carey!

Jordan's first encounter with LCBH took place back in the summer of 2013. After graduating from the University of Miami Law School, Jordan yearned for colder and snowier pastures and returned to the Chicagoland area where he was raised. A friend of a friend brought him to an LCBH event in Millennium Park where he met LCBH staff and learned about their work. Now, almost two years later, Jordan has become a familiar face around the LCBH office having volunteered over 1300 hours.

Housing Advocate in the Making

April 16, 2015 posted in LCBH News, Pro Bono, Interns

Kira Wilpone-Jordan learned about Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing (LCBH) as a first year law student (1L) while attending DePaul Law School. She attended a Brown Bag Lunch sponsored by the Center for Public Interest Law where she heard LCBH's pro bono coordinator, Samira Nazem, speak about the agency. Intrigued by what she heard, Kira applied to join LCBH as a summer intern. Two years later, Kira continues to volunteer and has worked with three different legal programs at LCBH advocating on behalf of tenants.

As a strong supporter of LCBH's mission, Kira firmly believes that housing is a basic human right. As she puts it, "people in positions of power know they have housing, so they don't think of the consequences of not having access to stable housing and living with housing insecurity. It's something that everyone uses, but often takes for granted."

House of Cards: Rebuilding

March 24, 2015 posted in Affordable Housing, LCBH News

Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing staff attorney Frank Avellone and clients recently contributed to an ongoing series of exhibitions by ART WORKS Projects. ART WORKS Projects’ mission is, “to use design and the arts to raise awareness of and educate the public about significant human rights and environmental issues.” ART WORKS Projects accomplishes this by doing focused exhibits centered on humanitarian issues, using a combination of storytelling, photography, and videography, to portray and disseminate a given issue. The current project they are focusing on is the nationwide affordable housing crisis as the most pressing humanitarian crisis in the U.S., and the individuals and/or families who have been directly impacted by this crisis in America.

The ART WORKS Projects is titled House of Cards: Rebuilding

Opening Reception with Artists & Experts
April 8, 6:25 PM - 9:00 PM

Panel: Confronting Housing Insecurity
April 29, 6:25 - 8:00 PM

All events are held at 625 N. Kingsbury Street, Chicago FREE & Open to the Public

For more information, please visit http://www.artworksprojects.org/events/house-of-cards-rebuilding/

On the Road with LCBH

February 18, 2015 posted in Foreclosure, LCBH News, Training

Going to court can be a very intimidating experience. Imagine finding yourself as a renter, paying your rent on time each month, and then being brought into eviction court because your building went into foreclosure! Do you have to move? When? What about your security deposit?

Many people believe that a person’s right to live in a rental property is contingent on the landlord continuing to own the property, or that when the landlord loses ownership of the building that the renters also lose their leases. In fact, this is not always the case. For renters, foreclosure does not mean “Get Out Now”!

Timely and accurate legal information can be crucial for renters. LCBH’s Tenants in Foreclosure team works to make people aware that renters may be able to stay, even if their landlord loses the property. LCBH shares this information with stakeholders throughout Illinois, hosting free renters’ rights workshops, distributing brochures, and referring renters to our helpline.

LCBH staff have been on the road throughout Illinois, providing brochures to Illinois Township Supervisors, meeting librarians and sharing resources at the Illinois Library Association annual conference, forging new partnerships, and strengthening current collaborations. Thanks to these visits, our Tenants in Foreclosure Helpline will now be included in the Peoria Landlord Tenant Handbook published by Housing Action Illinois.

Integration of Supportive Services

January 20, 2015 posted in Supportive Services, LCBH News

Our Intake Supervisor, Sue Scholten, has been with LCBH for five years. In this article, Sue shares some perspectives on the integration of supportive services when helping renters with legal problems.

According to Sue, it all starts with the intake interview, which is not really an interview, but rather a conversation that involves listening to the multiple messages the person presents and the environment from which those messages emerge.

In the beginning, when listening to an individual’s story for the first time, we look for factual information that are legal defenses to an eviction and can inform the attorneys when deciding whether LCBH will be able to take the case or not. During this process, there are multiple messages about the “person in environment” that emerge and may be of concern to LCBH’s supportive services team. Underneath the basic facts of their potential legal case, there is the psychological and narrative messages that have evolved from long- term economic disadvantage, non-responsive institutional systems, and family and friend support systems with limited resources to assist this person.

Just as an individual’s personal experiences may create inspiring resiliency, for others there is psychological and social exhaustion that evolves from systems that create disadvantage and exclusion. It is in this undefined area of response to events that an individual may need additional assistance in the form of supportive services.

Spring 2015 Supportive Service Interns

January 20, 2015 posted in Supportive Services, LCBH News, Interns

from left: Carla Feger, Lee Reisman, Luke Smith and Victoria Newcomb

LCBH welcomes four interns to the Supportive Services team for the Spring semester of 2015. These interns gain valuable professional experience while helping LCBH clients facing housing instability or possible homelessness.

Carla Feger – Carla is a first-year student at the Jane Addams College of Social Work at the University of Illinois at Chicago. During college, she studied psychology and took some education courses to learn more about equity concerns in education. As Carla continued her learning process, she served with City Year in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and mentored seventh-grade students who taught her a lot about the world. This experience affirmed her passion to work with students to help provide them with a rewarding experience and to achieve to the fullest potential. Carla decided to pursue a Masters in School Social Work and chose to intern with LCBH’s Supportive Services department to learn more about the housing issues that families face and how those issues significantly affect students’ lives, including their success in school.

A Donation to LCBH Helps Bridge the Justice Gap

December 18, 2014 posted in LCBH News

From all of us at LCBH, thank you for your tremendous support!

When you donate a tax-deductible gift to Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing, a non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization, you become a partner helping to achieve the LCBH mission: to improve housing stability in Chicago by promoting the rights of renters to access to safe, decent, and affordable housing. Your support will provide families with legal assistance and supportive services that help prevent homelessness, improve substandard living conditions, and preserve affordable housing. This is an opportunity to invest in our very own community.

Your charitable donation to LCBH will help:

Provide fair and meaningful access to the justice system;
Deliver supportive services to help stabilize housing; and
Preserve affordable housing units and improve habitability conditions to help ensure access to decent housing.

Other ways you can support Lawyers’ Committee for Better Housing:

In Kind Donations

For non-profits, securing adequate resources is always a challenge. Most funders do not provide support for administrative or office capacity. Many of these needs can be met through generous in-kind donations! In-kind donors are recognized at LCBH events, on the LCBH website, and in the LCBH Annual Report. LCBH has a wish list of goods, services, and spaces that would greatly benefit LCBH’s organizational needs and help keep vital LCBH programs running! These include: