1-STRIKE RULE CURBS DRUGS, AT A PRICE

RALEIGH - Mary D. McCullers will always remember the summer day Raleigh
police entered her home at 937 Harp Terrace.

They came through both the front and back doors, she recalls, overturning
mattresses and tossing her closet. They told McCullers, who was working
part-time at a local day-care center, that her son and grandson had been
caught blocks away with some illicit drugs.

Because she lived in the Halifax Court public housing complex, she could be
evicted. And within a year, after 15 years in public housing, she was
kicked out.

"Why can't they make an exception?" asked McCullers, now 57. "A mother
wants to see her children. Even God gives you a second chance."

Triangle public housing authorities disagree. Since 1999, they have evicted
about 160 tenants under the "one strike, you're out" policy.

About six years ago they started requiring stricter leases that hold
tenants accountable for drug activity on or off public property by
relatives or guests -- even if the tenant doesn't know about it.

On March 26, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law, over the objections of
advocates for tenants who sued to overturn it.

One of the evictions the court considered mirrors McCullers' case: an
Oakland, Calif., great-grandmother whose daughter was caught with cocaine
and a crack pipe three blocks from the complex where the two lived.

It is the worst-case scenario Michael A. Stegman and other public housing
advocates considered when they proposed the anti-drug law.

Stegman, now chairman of the department of public policy at UNC-Chapel
Hill, took a leave in 1993 to serve as assistant secretary for policy
development and research at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban
Development. For four years he helped the Clinton administration try to
rebuild deteriorating public housing complexes.

Policy-makers had no desire to infringe on residents' rights, he said. But
they found themselves in a quandary: To persuade Congress to spend more
money rebuilding crumbling complexes such as Halifax, they had to ensure
drug problems would not persist.

So in 1996, President Clinton ordered HUD to encourage stricter enforcement
of the "one strike, you're out" law, originally passed in 1988. It applies
to 1.2 million families who live in public housing and also to families
using HUD subsidies to rent private apartments.

"Ultimately what won the day was the safety and well-being of the whole
versus the safety and well-being of the family," Stegman said. "It takes
very little to endanger everyone else who is living in that building."

Public housing complexes in the Triangle did get safer. Drug-related crime
reported on the properties began to drop in 1996, police say, about the
same time police substations were built in complexes such as Chavis Heights
and Walnut Terrace. Housing managers and community police said residents
realized the risks of ignoring suspicious behavior by family and friends
and started policing themselves.

The number of "one strike" evictions in the Triangle has remained about the
same since stricter enforcement began, always a small proportion of the
total number of evictions.

Housing authority officials said they go after problem tenants for
nonpayment of rent first -- the most common reason for eviction across the
Triangle. If that fails, they said they may try to prove ongoing drug
violations, which require more evidence. In some cases, a drug incident can
trigger an eviction process.

Court records show McCullers was evicted for missing a rent payment, which
housing authority staff said they pursued after the drug incident. Since
1999, the Durham Housing Authority has evicted 105 tenants for drug
offenses, the Raleigh authority 37, Wake County three and Chapel Hill about 15.

There are grievance procedures designed to prevent managers from forcing
out tenants unfairly, but tenant advocates say "one-strike" policies make
the hearings little more than a formality.

"It pares down the due process these people would otherwise have," said
George Cook, a staff attorney with East Central Community Legal Services.
"All you have to do is make the allegation, and essentially the housing
authority wins."

Tenants facing eviction can make their first appeal at an administrative
hearing. If a family member is at fault, a tenant may be allowed to take
the relative off the lease before the case goes to civil court.

McCullers chose to remove her son from her lease, but the Raleigh authority
pursued the eviction anyway, following neighbor complaints of drug
activity. Housing authority officials said they take into account
extenuating circumstances but that some tenants simply exhaust the
possibilities.

"You're not entitled to have a house just because you're poor. You have to
earn it," said Allison Hapgood, special assistant to the executive director
of the Raleigh authority.

But Cook said the housing authority could do more to investigate claims
that lead to evictions, and to weigh the consequences. For some, eviction
amounts to a lifetime ban from public housing nationwide, he said.

"We need to open up the process, not close the process," he said. "That is
what this does. It risks evicting innocent parties."

Nearly three years after her eviction, McCullers has yet to find a steady
home. She stays with friends and vows never to return to public housing,
afraid her sons could not visit without provoking another raid. "I don't
want to be in a place where my kids can't come," she said.