Massachusetts tenants facing eviction proceedings usually walk through the courthouse doors at a stark disadvantage. In 2024, just 4.3 percent came with a lawyer, while their landlords had attorneys in 90 percent of cases.
A state program launched two years ago is trying to level that imbalance. Unlike in criminal cases, where every defendant is entitled to a lawyer regardless of ability to pay, eviction proceedings are civil cases with no such guarantees.
Advocates waged an eight-year campaign for public funding of legal counsel for low-income tenants, which finally found life as a limited pilot program in the state’s 2025 budget. But attorneys and advocates who work in housing courts say the program is operating against a backdrop that keeps getting worse: a housing crisis showing little sign of improvement, persistently high eviction filings, and a Legislature that has so far only been willing to fund the Access to Counsel Program year to year without making it permanent law.
The Legislature first appropriated $2.5 million in the fiscal year 2025 budget to launch the program as a pilot, administered by the nonprofit Massachusetts Legal Assistance Corporation. This cycle, Gov. Maura Healey has again proposed $2.5 million, and the House Ways and Means Committee has recommended $3 million, while MLAC is asking for $4 million.
“We need a lot more money, because even $3 million is not nearly enough for what the need is,” said Erin Van Pelt, MLAC’s director of communications.
More than 38,000 eviction cases were filed in Massachusetts in 2023, up from roughly 23,000 in 2021. Betsy Sula, executive director of MetroWest Legal Services, one of six regional legal aid organizations representing tenants contracted under the program, told legislators in November that five years ago her organization turned away about 65 percent of people who sought help. With increased state funding, that figure has dropped to about 45 percent.
Representation under the program is limited to households with incomes at or below 125 percent of the federal poverty line – $41,250 annually for a family of four or $19,950 for an individual in 2026.
Published by MassINC