BOZEMAN — On Tuesday, the Bozeman City Commission passed an ordinance providing legal defense to renters facing eviction. It’s the first of its kind in Montana, and the first of its kind for a city this size.
“It’s a step towards ending homelessness,” says Connie Howell, who has lived and rented in Bozeman for going on 26 years.
“We moved over here to Bozeman because we were homeless in Missoula,” said Howell, whose family was evicted from their Missoula rental in 1999.
“The process was the deputy sheriffs knocking on the door, handing me my papers, telling me I had five days to get out, and my landlord in the background snickering,” said Howell.
This led Howell’s family – including her young child – to live in a state campground for months.
Bozeman becomes first Montana city to guarantee legal defense for renters facing eviction
“I don’t ever want to have another child to go through what my child went through when we were homeless,” she said. “Eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because that’s all we can afford. Pulling up camp every day because we didn’t know if we were going to be able to stay there that night."
It’s because of what Howell’s child went through that passing the right to counsel ordinance is so important to her. The ordinance will provide full legal representation to any tenant facing eviction.
“It would’ve stopped a retaliation eviction,” said Howell.
Deputy Mayor Joey Morrison shared the same sentiment.
“It is not about suing landlords; it is about ensuring tenants have a fair shake in the eviction process,” said Deputy Mayor Morrison. “This program will create the potential to postpone or avoid eviction altogether, which is costly for tenants and for landlords.”
Morrison said this was the first action he took when he became a city commissioner last year because of its effectiveness.
“When we spend public dollars on legal aid programming, it is an extremely effective anti-poverty measure,” said Morrison,
Morrison says in the past, just 1% of Bozeman tenants were represented in eviction court, in a city where 60% of residents are renters.
“The City of Bozeman has consistently been the least affordable, the fastest rising rents, the highest housing costs,” said Morrison.
He says general fund dollars will be used to pay for this program. For now, Morrison says they have set aside less than $200,000.
“We don’t have a budget for it this time around,” he said.
MTN asked Morrison what he would say about this program to people who are not renters.
“At the end of the day, anti-poverty measures are public safety measures,” said Morrison. “That to me is the purpose of general fund dollars.”
Morrison says the ordinance goes into effect on December 16th.
