In abstract
The final statewide eviction protections for low-income California tenants affected by COVID-19 ended Thursday, however many nonetheless haven’t heard again about their lease aid functions. Some native protections are nonetheless in place.
Eviction protections for tens of thousands of California households nonetheless ready in line for funds from the state’s multi-billion greenback lease aid program expired Thursday.
Since September 2020, the Legislature has handed and Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed 4 legal guidelines shielding tenants who had been unable to pay lease as a consequence of COVID-19 from eviction. The most up-to-date extension shielded tenants by way of June 30 who had utilized for lease aid from the state’s $5 billion program by the March 31 deadline however had but to listen to again or obtain funds. Those tenants can now be dropped at court docket by their landlords.
“It’s highly unlikely that they are going to get through all these applications by June 30, when the eviction protections expire,” Sarah Treuhaft, vice chairman of analysis at PolicyLink, a nonprofit that has been reviewing the state’s lease aid program, mentioned throughout a press convention this week. “This means they are likely to be evicted and they might eventually get rental assistance.”
Debra Carlton, chief lobbyist for the California Apartment Association, mentioned they’ve requested their members to not take their tenants with pending functions to court docket.
The state Department of Housing and Community Development, which administers this system by way of a contractor, didn’t reply to a number of interview requests.
The lease aid program has paid greater than $3.8 billion to 329,000 households, based on the state’s public data dashboard. More than 28,000 preliminary candidates and 57,000 individuals who reapplied have not yet heard back, based on PolicyLink, which has been reviewing weekly program information from the state by way of Public Record Act requests.
Horne LLP, a Mississippi-based accounting agency that makes a speciality of catastrophe aid, is being paid a complete of $278 million to distribute $4.5 billion of the federal lease aid funds, based on a contract renewal dated April 1 that CalMatters obtained by way of the Public Records Act on June 17.
State Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, a Democrat from Oakland and co-author of the final extension, acknowledged this system has been “incredibly frustrating.” She mentioned the state housing division had assured her qualifying functions can be paid.
“I think it’s no secret that it’s had challenges,” she mentioned. “And while I’m sympathetic to some of the challenges we’ve had as a state government in terms of dealing with a global pandemic that none of us anticipated, it’s also our job as government to run well especially when you’re talking about critical social safety nets.”
But there’s a silver lining for tenant advocates. A key portion of the now expired regulation was the preemption of extra stringent native measures towards eviction, a lot of which can now go into impact, together with in Los Angeles County.
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The state faces a minimum of two lawsuits over this system from tenant advocates, who argue it has denied funding to qualifying tenants and isn’t protecting the quantity of rental debt originally promised.
More than 135,000 individuals — or practically a 3rd of all households — who utilized for lease aid had their functions rejected as of June 17, based on information CalMatters obtained from the housing division by way of the Public Records Act. That quantity spiked in the previous couple of weeks as this system wound down. The lawsuit, which cites the identical set of knowledge, says tenants are receiving little to no rationalization for his or her denials, which makes it tough to contest the ultimate choice.
“Tenants are facing eviction even as their landlords are given these giant checks and tenants who are eligible for assistance are being denied with these cryptic notices that don’t tell them why. It just doesn’t make sense,” mentioned Madeline Howard, a senior workers lawyer at Western Center on Law & Poverty, one of many teams suing the state over this system.
Wicks mentioned the newest state funds, permitted this week, consists of practically $2 billion to pay again the state for a line of credit score opened earlier this 12 months to pay tenants who submitted functions previous to March 31, though it doesn’t embrace any new funds for lease aid. The program coated lease for as much as 18 months between April 1, 2020 and March 31, 2022 for low-income tenants who had been financially impacted by COVID-19.
