Housing and Homelessness Prevention
Community Homeless Court
The Community Homeless Law Center Project is to provide legal assistance to HUD eligible homeless persons to remove legal barriers to obtaining and maintaining permanent housing and income. Services include a wrap-around approach to address the needs of homeless clients that involves both legal and social services. Legal services can address health, public benefits, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), and Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), domestic violence, Homeless Court, consumer, education, child support, and other matters.
Equal Access Fund Homelessness Prevention Project
The Equal Access Fund Homelessness Prevention Project is to prevent low-income tenants from becoming homeless. Services include expanding direct legal representation to an additional number of low-income tenants facing unlawful detainer (whether or not the landlord has counsel), and providing comprehensive assistance to obtaining available non-legal resources to ensure tenants stay housed (such as ensuring receipt of eligible income or benefits to improve housing stability).
Housing and Disability Advocacy Project
The Housing and Disability Advocacy Project assists to help individuals experiencing homelessness obtain disability for eligible recipients.
Mobilehome Advocacy Project
The Mobilehome Advocacy Project seeks to increase awareness of the rights of mobilehome residents and to prevent mobilehome residents from becoming homeless. Services include providing counsel, advice, and representation for pre-eviction and eviction disputes, presenting community workshops and presentations to residents and stakeholders, and engage in activities to increase awareness.
Neighborhood Revitalization Project
The Neighborhood Revitalization Project works to remove obstacles to safe, healthy, and habitable neighborhoods through outreach, education, collaboration, and litigation. Services include advocating for Code Compliance to become an active participant in combatting dilapidated housing conditions and to enforce building, health and safety codes.
Sargent Shriver Housing Project
The Sargent Shriver Housing Project works to prevent homelessness by assisting low-income tenants with the unlawful detainer (eviction) process. The project assists tenants in an eviction lawsuit when the landlord is represented by an attorney by helping tenants understand the eviction (unlawful detainer) legal process and/or represent them in trial or aid in negotiating a mandatory settlement conference.
The Project can also make referrals to agencies that prevent homelessness, provide relocation assistance, or connect clients with services relating to employment, education, and family necessities.
Landlord-Tenant Assistance Center
Through a partnership between GBLA and the Kern County Superior Court, the Landlord-Tenant Assistance Center (LTAC) provides a variety of services to help resolve landlord-tenant disputes. LTAC assists low-income tenants with landlord disputes pre-eviction.
Services include legal counsel, mediation, educational workshops, case management, and referrals for housing and community resources. The goal of the Center is to help unrepresented parties understand and prepare for court or, whenever possible, help landlords and tenants reach out-of-court settlements through mediation.
The Center is located at the Kern County Superior Court, Metropolitan Division, 1415 Truxtun Ave., in Bakersfield on the Third Floor.
For Self-Help Assistance on Tenant Evictions, please visit the Kern County Superior Court: Self-Help for Evictions