Housing is a human right, but Maryland’s system works mainly in landlords’ favor

More than a dozen pieces of legislation in the Maryland legislature are aimed at correcting what The Post has called a “rights equation [that] is badly tilted in [landlords’] favor.” Scores of regional and statewide organizations, the attorney general’s office, responsible legislators and hundreds of thousands of renters are looking to the legislature’s leadership to act. Yet the prevailing wisdom of these leaders and landlord supporters is that the system works. It does, but mostly for landlords. In coming months, more than 200,000 Maryland renters risk eviction from their homes. They will feel what one Gaithersburg retiree felt as he simultaneously faced heightened vulnerability to the coronavirus and the loss of housing.