After the Moratorium: National Eviction Resources and Data

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A provision of the CARES Act which has, so far, protected millions of people from losing their housing, is set to expire on July 25, 2020. Potentially, many residents of Harris County (and the rest of the nation) could be facing eviction. In response to the need for reliable information about housing instability, we’ve posted a number of helpful resources in this blog. In May, we wrote about the eviction moratoria issued at the federal and state levels, and in June, we provided links to information and self-help tools from Texas Law Help and Lone Star Legal Aid for those at risk of losing their homes. Now we are offering a bird’s eye view of eviction across our country, providing links to resources that present both national and state-by-state data.

• As Protections Expire, Millions Of Americans Face Threats Of Eviction – NPR Morning Edition, July 21, 2020 (Audio)

  • 6-minute nutshell interview with Matt Desmond, author of Evicted and founder of the Princeton Eviction Lab

• STOUT interactive eviction tool -- Developed by Stout Risius Ross, LLC (STOUT) with input from National Coalition for a Civil Right to Counsel (NCCRC)

  • Provides access to data on estimated number of tenants experiencing rental shortfalls along with data showing tenant confidence levels in their ability to pay next month’s rent.       

• COVID-19 Housing Policy Scorecard – Princeton Eviction Lab

  • See the list of additional COVID-19 housing resources and tools built by other organizations

• COVID-19 Protections for Homeless Populations -- National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty

  • See compiled list of COVID-19 Resources on Housing Alternatives

• Eviction Moratorium Maps – Regional Housing Legal Services (RHLS)

  • Presents a graphic visualization of moratoria in effect in each state, at each phase of eviction

• Federal Eviction Moratoriums — National Low Income Housing Coalition

  • Searchable database and map allow some renters to identify if their home is covered by the CARES Act eviction moratoriums

• Just Shelter

  • Identifies organizations that preserve affordable housing, prevent eviction, and reduce family homelessness; Presents personal eviction stories

• The Scarlet E: Unmasking America’s Eviction Crisis – On the Media (Audio)

  • A four-part series on the “eviction epidemic” in this country; Hosted by Brooke Gladstone

Contact-Tracing Apps: Over Before They Began

The concept is easy to understand: the phone you already have in your pocket will communicate with other phones nearby, and if one of those phones belongs to a person who shortly thereafter tests positive for COVID, in between Facebook alerts and reminders to feed your virtual Neko Atsume cats, your phone will notify you of this potential exposure.

Governments around the world hailed this technology as a “game changer” for contact tracing, one method through which public health officials look to contain a pandemic’s spread. If it is possible to quickly and easily identify all the people an infected person may have infected, and those people immediately self-quarantine, exponential spread should be stopped in its tracks.

Yet five months into our new world, contact tracing apps are less promising than ever. The reason: privacy concerns every step of the way, from development to adoption.

Experts agree it is theoretically possible to create a functional contact tracing app that protects user privacy by not centralizing personal data. But distrust abounds. Both Apple and Google rolled out operating system technology for contact tracing app developers that relies on this decentralized data approach. Yet, due to poor actions and flimsy security in the past by tech giants, governments around the globe have expressed skepticism that these systems, which incorporate GPS-based monitoring of users, are truly airtight. The fear is that the right hacker and the wrong soft spot in security could expose a detailed record of daily movements of every user on the planet. Such a possibility raises concerns that are ethical, philosophical, and legal.

To sidestep this issue, some governments have attempted to develop apps based on Bluetooth rather than GPS. Phones will use their Bluetooth functions to anonymously communicate with other phones in their proximity, no GPS required. However, because Bluetooth has a wide physical range, these apps lack the precision of the GPS-based technology made available through Apple and Google. Attempts to mitigate these issues have been overly restrictive. For example, the Bluetooth-based app released by the French government only managed to identify 14 potential cases of exposure nationwide.

Even if a government were able to develop an app it could guarantee was totally and completely devoid of privacy concerns, would enough citizens trust that was true?

Modeling out of Oxford University suggests a full 60% of a population needs to download and use the app for a contact tracing app to help reduce community spread. In a local context, that is a little lower than the 67% of Americans who watched the 2019 Super Bowl, and about the same percentage of eligible Americans who voted in the 2016 Presidential election.

About 66% of Americans told Pew Research in June that they regularly wear masks outside their homes, and if true, that suggests there could be widespread buy-in to a simple, trustworthy contact-tracing app. Still, so far the nation with the most widespread adoption of a contact-tracing app has been tiny Iceland, which capped out at 38%. It seems while people around the globe use the internet to willingly hand their private information to corporations every day, as a species we remain deeply skeptical of being tracked by our governments.

Even if Americans were racing to potentially be monitored, only four states have announced their intention to make a contact-tracing app available: Alabama, North Dakota, South Carolina, and Virginia. In contrast, 17 states including Texas have definitively said they will not produce such an app. No state has publicly unveiled an app, months into the crisis, as cases in the United States continue to surge.

Other countries, such as New Zealand and Taiwan, have managed to stamp out COVID without widespread use of contact-tracing apps.

All this suggests that our modern COVID problem may ultimately be solved through relatively old-fashioned means: limit contact with others, wear a mask, and wash your hands.

In the Interest of the Public Good

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Today’s blog post began as a discussion about the debate surrounding intellectual property protections for the development of a COVID-19 vaccine, but, in the course of reading about the conflict between pro-patent pharmaceutical companies and those who promote public access to the vaccine, the discussion evolved into a reflection on the development of the Internet. We are providing links to some good resources about the controversy around vaccine patent protections at the conclusion of this piece, but the focus of this blog post is actually the development of the world’s greatest vehicle for communication without which modern life is unimaginable – the World Wide Web.

In answering the question, “Who owns the patent to the polio vaccine?,” Jonas Salk famously said that it belongs to the people. “Could you patent the sun?,” he replied.  Tim Berners Lee, the pioneering computer scientist who developed the World Wide Web, might have said the same. His vision was clear – access to the Internet via the World Wide Web should be open and transparent. Creating an egalitarian space free from the influence of private interests was central to his design. Today, this vision is being challenged by private companies who prioritize profit over the public good. Advocates for network neutrality are pushing back. Regulating telecommunications companies and their control of online data streams is necessary, they argue, to ensure equal access to websites, applications, and online content. Similar arguments are being made with respect to the development of a COVID-19 vaccine.

Some say that, in the interest of global public health, the vaccine should belong to the people and made widely available to all who want it. Millions of public dollars are being spent to fund research for a vaccine, so, as the argument goes, any medical discovery made in the pursuit of a vaccine should be shared. Pharmaceutical companies argue otherwise. They stand to profit greatly from the sale of a vaccine for which there will be an overwhelming global demand. Clearly, the interests of the public and those of pharmaceutical companies are greatly at odds…or are they?

Apart from concerns about who should have access to either vaccines or the World Wide Web, there is a debate about what is created and what is discovered. The World Wide Web is clearly a creation, invented by a brilliant mind who shared it with the entire globe. The genesis of vaccines, however, is not as clear. Is a vaccine created or discovered? Teasing out the answer to this question is central to the discussion around patenting a vaccine or giving it away for the benefit of all.

To explore the vaccine dispute further, see links below.

• The History of Vaccines: A Timeline — The College of Physicians of Philadelphia

• Whoever Invents a Coronavirus Vaccine will Control the Patent – and, Importantly, Who Gets to Use It — The Conversation

• A Covid-19 Vaccine Will Need Equitable, Global Distribution — Harvard Business Review

• Coronavirus: Everyone Wins When Patents are Pooled — Nature

• The Covid-19 Vaccine Should Belong to the People — The Nation

• The Way We Produce and Patent Drugs Will Kill COVID-19 Patients — Jacobin

On-the-Go Scanning with Office Lens

As many of us continue to work from home, accessing the right tech tools — software and hardware — is essential but not always easy. For instance, how do you share digital scans of printed documents without having access to a document scanner? Of course you can always buy a desktop scanner or an all-in-one printing device, but perhaps you need to scan on the go, or you just don’t want to spend money on hardware that takes up space and might not be needed once we all return to work. As an alternative, the Harris County Law Library recommends Microsoft Office Lens, a free scanning app for your Apple or Android device that allows you to scan on the go and save your scanned documents to your phone, tablet, or the cloud. It also integrates with Microsoft’s Office 365 software, the cloud-based suite of office applications that’s available by subscription for an annual or monthly fee.

Office Lens is our scanning app of choice for its quality, reliability, consistency, and ease of use. Other scanning options do exist, and you may find one that you like better, but we’ve been using — and recommending — Office Lens to library patrons who need a quick and easy scanning solution from a trusted brand ever since a solo attorney at one of our Hands-on Legal Tech Training classes suggested that we try it out. We did, and we liked it!

It’s a great tool for digitizing and storing receipts, business cards, or other printed documents. Simply snap a photo using the camera on your phone or tablet, capturing it as a whiteboard, a document, a business card, or a photo. Then, edit the image by cropping, rotating, or adding text. Finally, store the image as a PDF file or a Word document, and share it as needed.

There are many other reliable and recommended scanning apps available, but Office Lens is our app of choice. For a good list of additional tech tools and resources, take a look at the ABA Legal Technology Buyer’s Guide as well as the Harris County Law Library’s Legal Tech Institute page of Legal Tech Links.

Coronavirus Resources and Other Legal Tech Links

The Harris County Law Library maintains a page of Legal Tech Links, including online resources to help practitioners stay informed, get organized, and build proficiency in using legal technology. Included in this list of links are the following:

• Affordable Practice Management Software Organizations

• Networks, and Institutes for Innovation

• Legal Journalism, Podcasts, and Blogs

The coronavirus pandemic is pushing many of us, including legal practitioners, to work from home. We are all learning to using tools, such as collaborative work platforms and teleconferencing software, to facilitate communication and connectivity. Many vendors and software service providers are offering free, short-term subscriptions to help people access the resources they need to work remotely. For nonprofit organizations or those providing pro bono legal services, the options are even greater. If you wish to explore the available resources and limited-term access options for a variety of practice management solutions, we recommend the following list of programs from the LawSites Blog — Coronavirus Resources.

Don’t forget that we at the Harris County Law Library are also offering free access to a variety of legal research tools, including Lexis Advance and Westlaw Edge. We are also continuing to provide virtual reference services five days a week via email, phone, and live chat. Explore all of these options on our website. We’re here to help!