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CarsonWatch is committed to stopping President Trump, HUD Secretary Ben Carson and their Congressional allies from any attempts to roll back fair housing protections and undermine the housing security of millions of Americans.

books

Matthew Desmond's `Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City'

Barbara Ehrenreich New York Times Book Review
Matthew Desmond is an academic who teaches at Harvard - a sociologist or, you could say, an ethnographer. But I would like to claim him as a journalist, and one who has set a new standard for reporting on poverty. In Milwaukee, he moved into a trailer park and then to a rooming house on the -poverty-stricken North Side and diligently took notes on the lives of people who pay 70 to 80 percent of their incomes for homes that are unfit for human habitation.

Wall Street’s New Housing Idea: More Pain for California Cities

Divya Rao and Kevin Stein Rooflines.Org
California cities are being victimized by the latest iteration of Wall Street predation—the purchase in bulk of distressed single-family mortgages and foreclosed homes, so-called Real Estate Owned (REOs) properties—with the intent to rent them. Through this REO to Rental process, investors are muscling out first time homebuyers, displacing tenants, outbidding nonprofit affordable housing developers, and changing the demographics of whole communities.

Boom & Bust in the City of Gold - Living & Leaving San Francisco

Carl Finamore Portside
The dramatic changes in the economic and social landscape of San Francisco has not gone unnoticed by some city officials, especially when confronted with continuing community pressure such as a the very lively and youthful Oct. 4 march through the Mission demanding an end to evictions.

Wall Street Sets Its Sights on Renters

Samuel Oakford Inter Press Service
“Previously you had individual ‘mom and pop’ landlords, but now you have companies that have large portfolios that span multiple states – [will] the systems that they are putting in place [...] be able to keep up?” -- Sarah Edelman, policy analyst at the Center for American Progress

The Stone that Brings Down Goliath? Richmond and Eminent Domain

Ellen Brown LA Progressive
Gayle McLaughlin, the bold mayor of Richmond, California is threatening to take underwater mortgages by eminent domain from Wall Street banks and renegotiate them on behalf of beleaguered homeowners. A member of the Green Party, which takes no corporate campaign money, she proved her mettle standing up to Chevron, which dominates the Richmond landscape. Richmond’s city council is only one vote short of the supermajority needed to pursue the eminent domain plan.

A City Invokes Seizure Laws to Save Homes

Shaila Dewan The New York Times
Scarcely touched by the nation’s housing recovery and tired of waiting for federal help, Richmond is about to become the first city in the nation to try eminent domain as a way to stop foreclosures.
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