Evicted Prologue & Part 1: Chapters 1–4 Summary & Analysis

Prologue

The Prologue for Evicted describes the struggles of a family that is evicted and forced to move several times in a single year, 2008. With each eviction, Arleen and her two sons are forced to move to a worse neighborhood than the one they leave behind. 100 years ago, evictions were far less common in the United States, and neighbors often tried to intervene against law enforcement that forcibly evicted people. Today, there are police and moving companies whose sole purpose is to serve and carry out evictions. Desmond’s plan is to follow eight families of varying ethnicities, some with children, some without, that are all dealing with the eviction process. While the book is set in Milwaukee, it is a universal story for cities in America, since Milwaukee’s eviction numbers are not significantly higher than other cities. Desmond states that housing is a critical issue when examining the factors that create poverty, but it is often overlooked.

Part 1: Rent

Chapter 1: The Business of Owing the City

Part 1, Chapter 1 follows Sherrena Tarver, Arleen’s new landlord, around on a typical day. Sherrena, a former elementary teacher, decided to pursue real estate. Through her ability to appraise property that most people would assume was worthless, she eventually came to own thirty-six rental units. Sherrena drives around in a beat-up 1993 Suburban, leaving her sports car at home, to collect rent, deal with maintenance, and serve evictions. She feels conflicted when she serves an eviction notice to Lamar, a man with no legs, who has several children. She reminds herself that she is still responsible for the mortgage and when tenants don’t pay, she loses money.

One of her properties is in the process of being shut down by the Department of Neighborhood Services (DNS) because the tenants were stealing electricity. Sherrena will lose money after the tenants are evicted, for unpaid rent and electrical work. She regrets having let the family rent the unit, knowing that they had been evicted three times at prior locations. At her last stop, Sherrena is confronted by the tenant’s mother, who claims she has called the city. Sherrena goes back to her office and returns that evening with an eviction notice for the family. While landlords are not allowed to retaliate against people who call DNS, she is able to evict them because the family is behind on rent. There is a verbal altercation outside between the tenants and Sherrena and her husband, including threats of violence. Sherrena is later contacted by Wraparound services, who will pay for Arleen’s first month of rent.

Chapter 2: Making Rent

Chapter 2 centers on Lamar. He sits with his two sons and some neighborhood boys playing cards and talking about the neighborhood, work, sex, drugs, and the police. Although Lamar has applied for Social Security Income (SSI), which is government assistance for low-income people with mental or physical disabilities, it has not been approved yet. Desmond describes the increasing rate of poverty among Black people in Milwaukee, where many industrial plants have closed. Half of working-age African American men don’t have jobs. After rent, Lamar was left with $78 for the month from his welfare check, to purchase food and clothes for himself and his two boys. Lamar had cleaned the basement of the housing unit, believing he had done $250 worth of labor, but Sherrena only credited him with $50. The end of the chapter follows Sherrena to a networking group for landlords where she offers to be the go-between for white landlords who want to buy rental properties on the North Side and rent to poor Black families.

Chapter 3: Hot Water

Chapter 3 moves between several people at a trailer park on the South Side of Milwaukee. Desmond comments that Milwaukee has always been one of the most segregated cities in America and remains so. The South Side is predominantly white, while the North Side is predominantly Black. Residents of the over 100 trailers in the College Mobile Home Park include labor workers, drug addicts, prostitutes, and people on government assistance. Lenny, the trailer park manager, maintains daily operations and helps enforce rent collection. Tobin Charney, the owner of the trailer park, visits most days. He tries not to issue evictions, but instead prefers to work out deals with tenants, since evicting people and moving in new tenants costs money. In May 2008, the Milwaukee License Committee unanimously voted to revoke Tobin’s license to run the trailer park, citing seventy different code violations and 260 police calls the previous year. Many of the residents feared having to move to the Black ghettos on the North Side. The chapter concludes with stories about Tobin collecting rent and threatening a varied assortment of tenants with eviction.

Chapter 4: A Beautiful Collection

Chapter 4 opens with Tobin making a deal with the city, a ten-point plan to improve the trailer park. He will hire 24-hour security, evict problematic tenants, and sell the trailer park within a year. Tobin then immediately starts processing evictions, and not just for renters who have been problematic. The chapter picks up the story of Ned and Pam, among the newly evicted tenants. They have a strained relationship involving drug addiction, prison time, and five children. Pam is seven months pregnant. She asks another tenant, Scott, if her family can move in with him, at least until the baby is born. Scott agrees, but when Tobin finds out, he issues an eviction to Scott as well, adding Pam’s rent debt to Scott’s.

Next section Part 1: Chapters 5–8