Volume 115 Issue 02
Trinitonian Serving Trinity University Since 1902
August 25, 2017
Solidarity vigil held to stand against hate Members of campus community come together to respect victims of tragedy KATHLEEN CREEDON
NEWS EDITOR On Monday, Aug. 21, the Humanities Collective offered a space for the Trinity community to gather and stand in solidarity with the victims of the Charlottesville riot, the Barcelona attack and other acts of violence. Students, faculty and staff were welcomed to the Miller Fountain to speak their minds about the recent events, to participate in respectful silence and to stand against hatred. The Humanities Collective is a group of faculty and students who act as a source for anything humanities related, both on campus and within the San Antonio community. They planned this event without hesitation to show their support for those affected both directly and indirectly by the acts of violence. “Humanities, although it is an academic area — distinguished from the sciences, connected to the arts, et cetera — nonetheless also represents a kind of value system, humanistic values. So, it seemed reasonably clear that one way we could kind of put the humanities forward is to be in support of people who have been affected badly by hate, to be against hate and in favor of sort of loving diversity in a community like Trinity’s and like San Antonio’s,” said Benjamin Stevens, visiting
A very exciting photo caption will go here. photo by PHOTOGRAPHER NAME
Students join hands in a circle to pray for the victims after the vigil, confirming the importance of coming together in times of hardship. photo by AMANI CANADA
assistant professor of classical studies and outreach coordinator for the group. The vigil was conceived when a few members of the collective were
unable to attend a similar rally in Austin due to obligations on campus. They decided that everyone who was required to be on campus during New
Student Orientation should still be able to express their sympathy. continued on PAGE 11
A reflection on Matthew Desmond’s “Evicted” Author pulls readers through the struggle of life in poverty MICAELA HOFFMAN
OPINION COLUMNIST Home does not exist for the families in “Evicted,” this year’s Reading TUgether selection. This study of the current housing crisis in the United States is an honest and heartbreaking work by Matthew Desmond. His dive in the dark waters of housing insecurity, poverty and greed is astonishingly candid. At times, I found myself hating the book; the words inside scream a truth I wish I could be deaf to, a truth that I was blind to in my time at Trinity. Desmond pulls us through the struggle of life in the shoes of those evicted in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Much like the lives of the subjects, the book transitions constantly from story to story; we visit the mobile homes and trailer parks, duplexes and inner-city apartments in disrepair;
we watch a mother struggle to shelter her children and a well-off nurse’s fall from grace into drug addiction. We cram together with families, friends or strangers into any square footage that can be afforded, any shelter that can be found. And when we finally catch a break and find that perfect place (after being turned down 89 times by various landlords) we are evicted once again. This time we will bounce in and out of a homeless shelter, while all of our belongings are repossessed as collateral by a storage company we couldn’t pay. We learn the ways of the poor with unparalleled intimacy. I could not read for more than an hour at a time. I felt sick and angry, even then. Lorraine Robles, a member of the San Antonio Housing Authority for over 12 years, helped me understand the relevance of eviction, homelessness and poverty in our city. San Antonio currently has 35,000 people on the wait-list for public housing and other forms of housing assistance. The housing crisis is more than just a story. Desmond conducted extensive research and found that 75 percent of those who qualify for housing assistance will never receive any form of help. One in four poor families spends over 70
Our Foreign Correspondent
An introduction to our abroad columnist, Soleil Gaffner, who is studying in Madrid, Spain this semester. PAGE 11 OPINION
percent of their income on rent and utilities. This creates serious material hardship, a fancy term for not being able to afford food, medical care, school supplies, work clothing — you can see the slippery slope. Eviction makes someone 15 percent more likely to be laid off and contributes heavily to student absenteeism. “Eviction can unravel the fabric of a community,” Desmond writes. The business of being a landlord and making profits off of the poor has grown, and is the primary employment for four times as many people today as it was in 1970. A landlord can evict a tenant for being a ‘nuisance,’ which is defined in terms of the number of calls made to the police in a set time period. In cases of domestic violence, many victims of abuse are stuck between the choice of calling the police for help and risking eviction. Criminal court gives everyone a right to attorney, but in civil court — where eviction cases are evaluated — there is no such law, and as a result, 90 percent of landlords have attorney representation while 90 percent of residents do not. It is up to the judgment of the landlord or property manager who is allowed to rent a house, and even though
Andrea Acevedo completes research Senior finishes virtual reality research depicting experience of life in detention centers. PAGE 15 PULSE
fair housing policies have existed to protect against discrimination based upon race and families with children, but enforcement is rare; in fact, families with children can be denied up to 70 percent of the time the search for shelter. Where are the checks and balances to this system? In “Evicted,” Desmond offers a solution: housing vouchers. Also known as ‘section 8’ housing, these are a public subsidy for rent; the tenant is required to pay only 30 percent of their income to rent and the federally funded voucher covers the rest. Currently, the federal budget for low-income housing is less that $41 billion, yet there are over $171 billion of homeowner tax benefits. The federal expense, therefore, is a difference of over four times currently benefiting those who own a home. By no means is this a perfect solution, though, for a number of reasons; besides the fact that a lot of policies would need to change in order to make this a reality, working in the private market remains a challenge for families. “[Section 8] is a whole different ball game,” Robles said. continued on PAGE 10
Intramural field dedication
Field dedicated to former Intramural director Jim Potter. PAGE 21 SPORTS