Collateral Damages: Landlords and the Urban Housing Crisis

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"Collateral Damages looks to answer the question: why do federal, state, and local laws which are meant to protect renters from disadvantageous landlord practices fall short? Indeed, it is the job of city authorities, including the PHA, court system, and building departments, to protect vulnerable renters and neighborhoods from landlord practices which can pose harm, including discriminatory screening, tenant harassment, and subpar property maintenance. The central premise of this book is that federal, state, and local laws create circumstances which are suitable for landlords to develop motivation and justification to treat tenants and their properties as disposable, and the opportunity to do so with low risk of sanctions. As part of its key contribution, Collateral Damages demonstrates that policies and procedures which are meant to protect tenants, and even appear "race neutral," can in fact produce negative consequences for lower-income tenants, and particularly tenants of color"--