Archive for December, 2011
Housing - What Immigration Authorities Do Not Tell You
Saturday, December 17th, 2011 | Real Estate Renting | Comments Off
Housing is a requirement for everyone. If you are an individual considering immigration then it is very possible that immigrant resources where you went to apply for your US Green Card did not mention the housing situation. As an non-native, legal or not, the new comer has many pitfalls to avoid where housing is concerned. They might not suffer from the same issues as an illegal, but even those who have gotten into the country through legal immigration channels may find they are at the mercy of an exploitative landlord or worse.
Part of the problem is that they are not aware of the laws that regulate what a landlord can or cannot do. They might feel that since conditions are better then what they left behind that they should not complain if the water shuts off or there is no heat. This is not something that immigrant resources necessarily covers. Authorities in the United States do not believe that those who have applied and been approved for a US Green Card would ever fall foul of such things, yet immigrants do.
It may be difficult for even a legal immigrant to handle legal situations to correct these conditions. If they do brave into this battlefield, they find that they have no representative to assist them, no one to translate the language or share understanding about the procedures, and may even be facing a lawyer for the landlord, when they are the one registering the complaint.
Thankfully there are groups formed to help with this situation. One such group indicates that in some urban areas as much as forty percent of the population is immigration filled. These people might be both legal and illegal lumped together, but the end result is the same. And within each group of people there are unique issues related to harassment, language barriers, and lack of knowledge. One major task faced with both housing experts and immigration advocates are that neither group has worked as closely with the other as they should to help address these issues.
But this is changing. The two worlds are coming to realize that the issues they are addressing cannot be handled from one side or the other. In arranging meetings in one major city, it became clear that the two groups not only realized they need to work together, but that they were eager to make the contacts required to make the joint venture successful.
Of course this is only part of the battle. Teaching immirgants their rights and then providing them with council should they need to enforce them is but one step. Not only do immigrants need to understand their rights in a court of law but there needs to be a better push for enforcement of existing housing codes. These codes not only need to be enforced, but inspections need to be carried out and when called for be done before and after major repairs are called for. Only in this way can the rights of every person to affordable housing be met.