Collateral consequences after conviction (part 2): housing issues

By Alexandria Staubach
 
For someone convicted of a criminal offense, even under the best circumstances—good financial resources, a job, decent credit—it can be very difficult to find housing.
 
The basic need of housing is a primary condition of supervision for many, but access to housing can be hard to come by.
 
In part 1 of this series, WJI reported on the professional licensing problems of Stuart Parker Arthur, a Wisconsin resident who was twice incarcerated for convictions in Missouri.
 
Arthur told WJI that after his release from custody in Missouri, he came back to Wisconsin and began to look for a place to live. It was a condition of his supervision.

Everywhere he applied inquired about his criminal history, he said. If he wasn’t denied outright, he was subsequently informed there was nothing available for him, he said.
 
Not checking the boxes on applications asking about convictions was “not really an option,” Arthur told WJI. “You’re on probation and there’s this whole piece where you’re supposed to be doing the right thing, to be honest.” Arthur said he also knew Missouri gave free access to court records and a simple search for him would show his criminal history.
 
Arthur moved in with his mother and began thinking about buying his own home. He “didn’t see another way,” he said.
 
Mortgage lender Sue Foley (the lender who eventually became his boss) told WJI that she worked with Arthur for more than a year to get him to circumstances that would allow him to qualify for a mortgage.

Arthur told WJI he ultimately purchased a home with help from his mother.
 
Purchasing a home is not a viable option, though, for most people returning to Wisconsin communities after conviction and incarceration. Many reentering individuals do not even have family to provide a place to stay or otherwise help.
 
According to “Who’s Coming Home?” a study conducted during 2019 and 2020 by Project Return in collaboration with Data You Can Use, about 2,475 people return annually to the Milwaukee area following incarceration. More than half are under age 35. Roughly 42% will have some need related to finding or maintaining a place to live. Those with shorter terms of incarceration show the greatest need for housing assistance: in 2019, 60% of people returning home had been incarcerated for two years or less, and half of that number had stable-housing needs.
 
According to the report, “the importance of finding a stable residence cannot be overestimated," and evidence suggests that the ability find secure housing during the first year of release reduces the probability of return to prison. Conversely, those who enter a homeless shelter in the first year after release face a higher risk of re-incarceration.
 
WJI spoke with Conor Williams, an economic policy analyst for Community Advocates who is familiar with the report and the issue. Williams facilitates the Milwaukee Reentry Council, a subcommittee of the Milwaukee Community Justice Council, which works to improve reentry outcomes and to reduce incarceration. Williams told WJI, “if we provide decent and affordable housing, (reintegration) becomes more manageable.” And, while Milwaukee has “reduced chronic homelessness over the last seven to eight years, we haven’t extended that to the reentry community.”
 
Williams and the Milwaukee Reentry Council are trying to bridge this gap by introducing a third party to the tenant/landlord relationship. Williams pointed to nonprofit organizations such as Project Return or the Alma Center mediating with a landlord on behalf of a tenant who has been previously incarcerated. Williams said that practice “needs to be built out in a more systematic way.”
 
Williams is a strong proponent of applying the “housing first” model to reentry. "Housing first" is a homeless assistance approach that prioritizes permanent residence without preconditions for the unhoused. Milwaukee County adopted a housing first model in 2015. According to the county’s website, the approach has saved taxpayers $30 million since. In it first five years the program reduced overall homelessness by 46% and “unsheltered street homelessness” by 92%.
 
Williams said that it costs roughly $45,000 a year to incarcerate someone, but resources are not made “available in a wise way to make people successful in reentry.” He highlighted the “reactive system” we have instead, addressing housing issues only after something has gone wrong.
 
A Minnesota study by nonprofits working in reentry between 2010 and 2017 concluded that 11 of 15 categories of criminal offenses (including marijuana possession, alcohol-related offenses, minor drug-related offenses, minor public-order offenses, and reckless driving) had no significant effect on housing outcomes. The study found that four categories (fraud, assault, property offenses, and major drug-related offenses) “may have a statistically significant effect” but that even in those cases the risk to landlords of a negative outcome was increased by only three to nine percentage points.

According to the study, data supports “a nuanced approached to screening based on criminal history” rather than a blanket ban by landlords on persons with prior convictions. A blanket ban “unnecessarily limits access to housing,” the report said.

Williams suggests the book Homeward: Life in the Year After Prison by Bruce Western for those wishing to explore the topic further.

Conor Williams will be the speaker at WJI's upcoming August Salon. Save the date and time: Aug. 28 at noon. Location in Milwaukee TBD.