Five Years and an Apple Tree
I rented from Pacific Rental Properties LLC in Medford, Oregon for approximately five years — first at 820 Taylor Street, then at 747 Highland Drive. I paid my rent. I maintained the property. I treated it like my home, because it was. I planted an apple tree in their yard that was just last fall beginning to look like a real, lovely addition to the property. I left every place I lived better than I found it.
None of that mattered when they decided they wanted me gone.
The First Eviction — Taylor Street
In October 2025, I moved from Taylor Street to another Pacific Rental Properties unit at Highland Drive. I had a zero balance on my Taylor account. Pacific Rental Properties approved my Highland tenancy under their own rental criteria — criteria that disqualify unpaid balances and eviction history. They knew my record. They approved me.
During the transition, my name remained administratively associated with the Taylor Street lease. I contacted PRP in December 2025 to get the proper paperwork to formally separate. I followed their process. On January 9, 2026 — the same day I sent a follow-up email — they filed an eviction against me at Taylor Street. They had written notice that I had moved. They filed anyway.
Case: Pacific Rental Properties LLC v. Tracey Howerton — Jackson County Circuit Court
- Case No. 26LT00703 — Taylor Street eviction
- January 9, 2026: Eviction filed. Same day as my follow-up email to PRP.
- February 13, 2026: Trial. Judge acknowledged I was no longer residing at Taylor. Dismissal discussed if I complied with move-out conditions.
- February 20, 2026: I returned the keys before the 11:59 PM deadline. The property was cleaned and documented on video.
- February 17–18, 2026: General Judgment was signed and entered — before the writ deadline even expired.
- April 6, 2026: Taylor judgment vacated. Attorney fees denied. I had complied with everything. The case was over. The record should never have existed.
At the February 13 trial, the landlord's attorney stated on the record that if I vacated the property cleanly within the four-day writ period, he would have the case dismissed as to me — because I was no longer residing there. The judge acknowledged he dismissed cases like that frequently. I relied on that. I complied completely. And they let the judgment sit anyway. They then filed a petition for over $2,000 in attorney fees for a case they told me would be dismissed.
I eventually filed my own ORCP 68 objection to the attorney fees. I drafted my own ORCP 71 motion. I did this while also raising my grandson, while fighting a separate custody case for my daughter, while facing car repossession, while searching for housing with an eviction record that should not have existed. The Taylor judgment was finally vacated on April 6, 2026. Attorney fees were denied. I won — on paper, on the facts, after all of it.
But no one can give me back what it cost to get there.
The Second Eviction — Highland Drive
On January 28, 2026 — the same day I appeared in Taylor court and refused to waive my right to a trial — Pacific Rental Properties posted a no-cause termination notice at my Highland Drive apartment. The notice stated on its face: "This notice is given without stated cause." I came home from court and it was on my door.
My Highland tenancy was HCV-assisted — a housing choice voucher through HUD. Under federal regulations (24 CFR 982.310), termination of an HCV tenancy during the lease term requires good cause and written notice specifying the grounds. Their notice stated none. They notified the housing authority the same day.
That timing — same day as my trial appearance, same day as my refusal to waive rights — is what Oregon law defines as retaliation under ORS 90.385.
Case No. 26LT06046 — Highland Drive
- January 28, 2026: No-cause termination posted at Highland — the day I refused to waive trial at Taylor court.
- March 11, 2026: Highland FED filed and served.
- March 25, 2026: Highland mediation resolves: No Judgment of Restitution. No money terms. No waiver of claims. Vacate by May 31, 2026.
The Highland case resolved without a judgment against me. But I am still leaving — vacating by May 31, 2026 — a home that Pacific Rental Properties terminated without cause, in violation of federal housing regulations, on the same day I exercised my legal rights in court.
What the System Actually Feels Like
You are listed as a Defendant on the paperwork. Not a Respondent. A Defendant. Before anything has been proven. Before you've said a word. You walk into a courthouse and you are already guilty of something — you just don't know what yet.
The mediators have done this so many times they don't see you. They see a file. They push the paper and close the drawer and go home. And you go home. Oh wait — you don't have one anymore. And for what? For absolutely nothing, in my case. I did nothing wrong.
You sit across from an attorney who finally feels like a savior — someone who will make it right — and you get tongue-tied because you have held onto this moment for so long. And then he says: "What can we prove, really?" And you realize: he gets to close his file drawer and go home too. He didn't lose anything. It wasn't his to lose.
I looked for that place. I looked at the courthouse, through all the paperwork I didn't understand at first. I looked online. I looked everywhere in Jackson County for someone who would just say: I see what happened to you. It was wrong. I am listening.
There was nowhere. There was no one. There was nothing.
So I Built It.
Rogue Valley Renters Voices is not a nonprofit. I do not have a grant or a staff. I do not have an office. I have, materially, very little right now. What I do have is the one thing that should have been offered from the very first day any of this started, and was not:
Humanity.
I am here. I am that person. I am that witness. I give a damn. And I will listen. That is all I can do — but I will do it, and I will do it with my name on it, and I will not close the drawer.
If you found this site, it means you needed it. Tell me what happened. I am here.