Pubdate: June 28, 1998
Source: New York Times (NY)
Contact:  http://www.nytimes.com/
Author: Frank Bruni

A BATTLEGROUND WITHOUT WINNERS IN THE WAR ON DRUG ABUSE

OAKLAND, Calif. -- It is difficult to imagine a man less threatening than
Herman Walker.

Slowed by a stroke one year ago, Walker, 75, spends much of his time in his
dingy one-bedroom apartment here, passing the hours with a Bible on his lap
and stuffed animals scattered around him like throw pillows on a fraying
couch. "They're company," Walker recently said, his words slightly garbled.
"I look at them so much they're human to me."

But according to housing officials in Oakland, Walker poses a danger to his
fellow tenants in public housing. And if these officials have their way, he
and his menagerie will have to find a new home.

Three times last year, the housing authorities said, they found cocaine or
cocaine paraphernalia in Walker's apartment or in the possession of a
private caretaker and another visitor. Even though Walker told officials he
was not aware of the drugs, they moved to evict him. A lawsuit that Walker
and three others have filed in response to eviction actions illustrates a
growing conflict between federal officials, who have urged local housing
agencies to crack down on illegal drug use, and some advocates for the poor,
who say that innocent people are falling victim to a Draconian offensive in
the war on drugs.

A 1996 directive issued by President Clinton and the Department of Housing
and Urban Development ordered local agencies that administer public housing
to enforce a law holding tenants responsible for any drug-related activity
that occurs inside their apartments or outside the premises by people living
there. Earlier this year, the Eviction Defense Center, a nonprofit legal
group, took the case of the four Oakland residents to federal court in San
Francisco to protest that directive. The case represents one of the most
serious legal challenges yet to the policy, which has led to a sharp rise in
drug-related evictions among the roughly three million Americans living in
public housing.

"It's beyond unfairness," Ira Jacobowitz, one of the lawyers working on the
case with the center, said of the policy. "Somebody can be evicted whether
or not they had any previous knowledge of, participation in, or ability to
control the situation."

Jacobowitz also noted that tenants could be evicted even if the accusations
of drug-related activity did not lead to criminal convictions. Last week,
U.S. District Court Judge Charles R. Breyer issued a preliminary injunction
against the evictions of the four plaintiffs in an opinion that questioned
the part of the policy related to drug-related activity outside an
apartment.

"The policy on its face appears irrational," Breyer wrote, "since the tenant
has not engaged in any such activity or knowingly allowed such activity to
occur." The lawsuit charges that the enforcement of the federal directive
deprives tenants of their constitutional rights to due process and freedom
of association. A trial is expected later this year. The resolution could
have an impact on the aggressiveness with which housing officials around the
country pursue these evictions.

HUD spokesman Stan Vosper said he could not discuss the merits of the case.
But he said that the directive, known as the "one strike" policy, was an
effort to make public housing safer for all residents and that local housing
authorities had been urged to use discretion on complaints. Randolph W.
Hall, a lawyer for the Oakland Housing Authority, said the eviction
proceedings against the plaintiffs were justified because the plaintiffs, at
least indirectly, brought drug-related activity into or near public housing.

"Look at who the victims are: these hundreds of thousands of mothers who
lost their kids to drive-by shootings or can't take their kids to the sand
boxes," Hall said. "You have to balance their rights." Hall said the Oakland
Housing Authorities pursues dozens of these evictions every year, only a
small percentage of which are contested. Two plaintiffs in the lawsuit are
grandmothers whose grandchildren, according to housing officials, were on
the apartments' leases and were found with marijuana in a parking lot
outside the apartments. Another plaintiff is a woman whose daughter and son
were separately found with cocaine outside the apartment, housing officials
said. In Walker's case, Hall said the multiple incidents showed Walker's
failure to discourage drug activity.

But Judge Breyer cited the Americans With Disabilities Act in saying that
Walker's right to home health care would be compromised by an obligation to
supervise a caretaker's activities.

Walker said there was a limit to his control over people who come to his
apartment. "I don't know what you have on you," he said to a visiting
reporter. "I'm not going to ask you, 'What do you have on you?"'

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Checked-by: "Rolf Ernst"