My guest is Marvin Pendarvis, my state House representative here in South Carolina. He's about my age, one of a handful of millennials in the legislature, and he's been one of the loudest voices in the state capital on the issues of housing insecurity and evictions.
I wanted to have him on the show because, 1, he's fighting an uphill battle that I think more people should know about, and 2, his hallmark issue is suddenly more important than ever. (And 3, he’s a new dad, so I wanted to talk dad stuff with him.)
Marvin and I live in North Charleston, which had the highest eviction rate of any city in the United States according to a 2018 study by the Princeton University Eviction Lab. This year during the pandemic, we had the tenuous protection of a state eviction moratorium, but that already expired. Now we have a federal eviction moratorium that's set to expire at the end of the calendar year. Just before I got on the call with Marvin, I was in a Zoom meeting with my local DSA chapter talking about what we can do to fight back against the wave of evictions that's about to hit our community.
I hope you enjoy this conversation. If you're looking for a good fight to pursue with your city council or state legislature, housing security is a good choice.
The episode art is “The Blue House” (1917) by Marc Chagall.
Episode 13: Landlord problems