WE ELECTED YOU, WHY?!
Frustration as Biden, Congress allow eviction ban to expireBy LISA MASCARO, JOSH BOAK and KEVIN FREKING
1 of 9
People from a coalition of housing justice groups hold signs protesting evictions during a news conference outside the Statehouse, Friday, July 30, 2021, in Boston. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)
Lawmakers said they were blindsided by President Joe Biden’s inaction as the deadline neared, some furious that he called on Congress to provide a last-minute solution to protect renters. The rare division between the president and his party carried potential lasting political ramifications.
Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., the chair of the Financial Services Committee, said Saturday on CNN: “We thought that the White House was in charge.”
Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., camped outside the Capitol, said: “I don’t plan to leave before some type of change happens.”
“We are only hours away from a fully preventable housing crisis,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., during a floor speech in a rare Saturday session as senators labored over an infrastructure package.
“We have the tools and we have the funding,” Warren said. “What we need is the time.”
More than 3.6 million Americans are at risk of eviction, some in a matter of days. The moratorium was put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as part of the COVID-19 crisis when jobs shifted and many workers lost income.
The eviction ban was intended to prevent further virus spread by people put out on the streets and into shelters. Congress approved nearly $47 billion in federal housing aid to the states during the pandemic, but it has been slow to make it into the hands of renters and landlords owed payments.
The day before the ban was set to expire, Biden called on local governments to “take all possible steps” to immediately disburse the funds.
“There can be no excuse for any state or locality not accelerating funds to landlords and tenants that have been hurt during this pandemic,” he said in a statement late Friday.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pointed Democratic House members in the same direction, urging them in a letter Saturday night to check into how the money already allocated has been distributed so far in their own states and localities. She said the Treasury Department, which transferred the funds earlier in the year, offered to brief lawmakers next week.
Biden set off the scramble by announcing Thursday he would allow the eviction ban to expire instead of challenging a recent Supreme Court ruling signaling this would be the last deadline.
The White House has been clear that Biden would have liked to extend the federal eviction moratorium because of the spread of the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus. But there were also concerns that challenging the court could lead to a ruling restricting the administration’s ability to respond to future public health crises.
People from a coalition of housing justice groups hold signs protesting evictions during a news conference outside the Statehouse, Friday, July 30, 2021, in Boston. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer)
On a 5-4 vote in late June, the Supreme Court allowed the broad eviction ban to continue through the end of July. One of those in the majority, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, made clear he would block any additional extensions unless there was “clear and specific congressional authorization.”
Biden, heeding the court’s warning, called on Congress on Thursday to swiftly pass legislation to extend the date.
Racing to respond, Democrats strained to draft a bill and rally the votes. Pelosi implored colleagues to pass legislation extending the deadline, calling it a “moral imperative,” to protect renters and also the landlords who are owed compensation.
Waters quickly produced a draft of a bill that would require the CDC to continue the ban through Dec. 31. At a hastily arranged hearing Friday morning to consider the bill she urged her colleagues to act.
But Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington, the top Republican on another panel handling the issue, said the Democrats’ bill was rushed.
“This is not the way to legislate,” she said.
Landlords, who have opposed the moratorium and challenged it repeatedly in court, are against any extension. They, too, are arguing for speeding up the distribution of rental assistance.
The National Apartment Association and several others this week filed a federal lawsuit asking for $26 billion in damages because of the impact of the moratorium.
Despite behind-the-scenes wrangling throughout the day, Democratic lawmakers had questions and concerns and could not muster support to extend the ban.
Revising the emergency legislation to shorten the eviction deadline to Oct. 18, in line with federal COVID-19 guidelines, drew a few more lawmakers in support — but still not enough for passage.
House Democrats, leaders tried to simply approve an extension by consent, without a formal vote, but House Republicans objected.
Democratic lawmakers were livid at the prospect of evictions in the middle of a surging pandemic.
Bush, who experienced homelessness as a young mother of two in her 20s, said that, at the time, she was working in a low-wage job.
“I don’t want anyone else to have to go through what I went through, ever,” said Bush, now 45, wiping away tears during an interview at the Capitol, where dozens had joined her protest. “I don’t care what the circumstances are and so I’m going to fight now that I’m in a position to be able to do something about it.”
Waters said House leaders should have forced a vote and Biden should not have let the warnings form one justice on the Supreme Court prevent him from taking executive action to prevent evictions.
“The president should have moved on it,” Waters said. She vowed to try to pass the bill again when lawmakers return from a recess.
By the end of March, 6.4 million American households were behind on their rent, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. As of July 5, roughly 3.6 million people in the U.S. said they faced eviction in the next two months, according to the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey.
Some places are likely to see spikes in evictions starting Monday, while other jurisdictions will see an increase in court filings that will lead to evictions over several months.
The administration is trying to keep renters in place through other means. It released more than $1.5 billion in rental assistance in June, which helped nearly 300,000 households. The departments of Housing and Urban Development, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs extended their foreclosure-related eviction moratoriums through the end of September on households living in federally insured, single-family homes late Friday, after Biden had asked them to do so.
Aides to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, the chair of the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, said the two were working on legislation to extend the moratorium and were asking Republicans not to block it.
___
Associated Press writers Alexandra Jaffe, Mark Sherman and Alan Fram contributed to this report.
Tenants prepare for unknown as eviction moratorium ends
By MICHAEL CASEY
AP
1 of 7
Roxanne Schaefer holds a photograph in the living room of her apartment, in West Warwick, R.I., Tuesday, July 27, 2021. Schaefer, who is months behind on rent, is bracing for the end to a CDC federal moratorium Saturday, July 31, 2021, a move that could result in millions of people being evicted just as the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus is rapidly spreading. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
BOSTON (AP) — Tenants saddled with months of back rent are facing the end of the federal eviction moratorium Saturday, a move that could lead to millions being forced from their homes just as the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus is rapidly spreading.
The Biden administration announced Thursday it would allow the nationwide ban to expire, saying it wanted to extend it due to rising infections but its hands were tied after the U.S. Supreme Court signaled in June that it wouldn’t be extended beyond the end of July without congressional action.
House lawmakers on Friday attempted, but failed, to pass a bill to extend the moratorium even for a few months. Some Democratic lawmakers had wanted it extended until the end of the year.
“August is going to be a rough month because a lot of people will be displaced from their homes,” said Jeffrey Hearne, director of litigation Legal Services of Greater Miami, Inc. “It will be at numbers we haven’t seen before. There are a lot of people who are protected by the ... moratorium.”
The moratorium, put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in September to try to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, is credited with keeping 2 million people in their homes over the past year as the pandemic battered the economy, according to the Princeton University’s Eviction Lab. Eviction moratoriums will remain in place in New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Illinois, California and Washington, D.C., until they expire later this year.
Elsewhere, the end of the federal moratorium means evictions could begin Monday, leading to a years’ worth of evictions over several weeks and ushering in the worst housing crisis since the Great Recession.
Roxanne Schaefer, already suffering from myriad health issues, including respiratory problems and a bone disorder, is one of the millions fearing homelessness.
In a rundown, sparsely furnished Rhode Island apartment she shares with her girlfriend, brother, a dog and a kitten, the 38-year-old is $3,000 behind on her $995 monthly rent after her girlfriend lost her dishwasher job during the pandemic. Boxes filled with their possessions were behind a couch in the apartment, which Schaeffer says is infested with mice and cockroaches, and even has squirrels in her bedroom.
The landlord, who first tried to evict her in January, has refused to take federal rental assistance, so the only thing preventing him from changing the locks and evicting her is the CDC moratorium. Her $800 monthly disability check won’t pay for a new apartment. She only has $1,000 in savings.
“I got anxiety. I’m nervous. I can’t sleep,” said Schaefer, of West Warwick, Rhode Island, over fears of being thrown out on the street. “If he does, you know, I lose everything, and I’ll have nothing. I’ll be homeless.”
More than 15 million people live in households that owe as much as $20 billion to their landlords, according to the Aspen Institute. As of July 5, roughly 3.6 million people in the U.S. said they faced eviction in the next two months, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey.
Parts of the South and other regions with weaker tenant protections will likely see the largest spikes, and communities of color, where vaccination rates are sometimes lower, will be hit hardest. But advocates say this crisis is likely to have a wider impact than pre-pandemic evictions, reaching suburban and rural areas and working families who lost their jobs and never before experienced an eviction.
“I know personally many of the people evicted are people who worked before, who never had issues,” said Kristen Randall, a constable in Pima County, Arizona, who will be responsible for carrying out evictions starting Monday.
“These are people who already tried to find new housing, a new apartment or move in with families,” she said. “I know quite a few of them plan on staying in their cars or are looking at trying to make reservations at local shelters. But because of the pandemic, our shelter space has been more limited.”
“We are going to see a higher proportion of people go to the streets than we normally see. That is unfortunate.”
The crisis will only get worse in September when the first foreclosure proceedings are expected to begin. An estimated 1.75 million homeowners — roughly 3.5% of all homes — are in some sort of forbearance plan with their banks, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. By comparison, about 10 million homeowners lost their homes to foreclosure after the housing bubble burst in 2008.
The Biden administration had hoped that historic amounts of rental assistance allocated by Congress in December and March would help avert an eviction crisis.
But so far, only about $3 billion of the first tranche of $25 billion had been distributed through June by states and localities. Another $21.5 billion will go to the states. The speed of disbursement picked up in June, but some states like New York have distributed almost nothing. Several others have only approved a few million dollars.
“We are on the brink of catastrophic levels of housing displacement across the country that will only increase the immediate threat to public health,” said Emily Benfer, a law professor at Wake Forest University and the chair of the American Bar Association’s Task Force on Eviction, Housing Stability and Equity.
Some places will see a spike in people being evicted in the coming days, while other jurisdictions will see an increase in court filings that will lead to evictions over several months.
“It’s almost unfathomable. We are on the precipice of a nationwide eviction crisis that is entirely preventable with more time to distribute rental assistance,” Benfer said.
“The eviction moratorium is the only thing standing between millions of tenants and eviction while rental assistance applications are pending. When that essential public health tool ends on Saturday, just as the delta variant surges, the situation will become dire.”
Many beleaguered tenants will be forced out into a red-hot housing market where prices are rising and vacancy rates have plummeted.
They will be stuck with eviction records and back rent that will make it almost impossible to find new apartments, leaving many to shack up with families, turn to already strained homeless shelters or find unsafe dwellings in low-income neighborhoods that lack good schools, good jobs and access to transportation. Many will also be debt-ridden.
Evictions will also prove costly to the communities they reside in. Studies have shown evicted families face a laundry list of health problems, from higher infant mortality rates to high blood pressure to suicide. And taxpayers often foot the bill, from providing social services, health care and homeless services. One study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition and Innovation for Justice Program at the University of Arizona found costs could reach $129 billion from pandemic-related evictions.
In Rhode Island, Schaefer has struggled to grasp why her landlord wouldn’t take federal rental assistance. Landlords, many of whom have successfully challenged the moratorium in court, argue the economy is improving and coronavirus cases are down in most places. Those who don’t take rental assistance refuse for a variety of reasons, including a desire to get the tenant out.
“It’s not that I wanna live here for free,” Schaefer said. “I know wherever you go and live, you gotta pay. But I’m just asking to be reasonable.”
“Why can’t you take the rent relief? You know, they pay,” she added. “In the paperwork it says they’re gonna pay, like, two months in advance. At least by then, two months, I can save up quite a bit of money and get to put a down payment on somewhere else to move, and you’ll have your money that we owe you and will be moving out.”
___
Associated Press reporter Rodrique Ngowi in West Warwick, Rhode Island, contributed to this report.
By MICHAEL CASEY
AP
1 of 7
Roxanne Schaefer holds a photograph in the living room of her apartment, in West Warwick, R.I., Tuesday, July 27, 2021. Schaefer, who is months behind on rent, is bracing for the end to a CDC federal moratorium Saturday, July 31, 2021, a move that could result in millions of people being evicted just as the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus is rapidly spreading. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
BOSTON (AP) — Tenants saddled with months of back rent are facing the end of the federal eviction moratorium Saturday, a move that could lead to millions being forced from their homes just as the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus is rapidly spreading.
The Biden administration announced Thursday it would allow the nationwide ban to expire, saying it wanted to extend it due to rising infections but its hands were tied after the U.S. Supreme Court signaled in June that it wouldn’t be extended beyond the end of July without congressional action.
House lawmakers on Friday attempted, but failed, to pass a bill to extend the moratorium even for a few months. Some Democratic lawmakers had wanted it extended until the end of the year.
“August is going to be a rough month because a lot of people will be displaced from their homes,” said Jeffrey Hearne, director of litigation Legal Services of Greater Miami, Inc. “It will be at numbers we haven’t seen before. There are a lot of people who are protected by the ... moratorium.”
The moratorium, put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in September to try to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, is credited with keeping 2 million people in their homes over the past year as the pandemic battered the economy, according to the Princeton University’s Eviction Lab. Eviction moratoriums will remain in place in New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Illinois, California and Washington, D.C., until they expire later this year.
Elsewhere, the end of the federal moratorium means evictions could begin Monday, leading to a years’ worth of evictions over several weeks and ushering in the worst housing crisis since the Great Recession.
Roxanne Schaefer, already suffering from myriad health issues, including respiratory problems and a bone disorder, is one of the millions fearing homelessness.
In a rundown, sparsely furnished Rhode Island apartment she shares with her girlfriend, brother, a dog and a kitten, the 38-year-old is $3,000 behind on her $995 monthly rent after her girlfriend lost her dishwasher job during the pandemic. Boxes filled with their possessions were behind a couch in the apartment, which Schaeffer says is infested with mice and cockroaches, and even has squirrels in her bedroom.
The landlord, who first tried to evict her in January, has refused to take federal rental assistance, so the only thing preventing him from changing the locks and evicting her is the CDC moratorium. Her $800 monthly disability check won’t pay for a new apartment. She only has $1,000 in savings.
“I got anxiety. I’m nervous. I can’t sleep,” said Schaefer, of West Warwick, Rhode Island, over fears of being thrown out on the street. “If he does, you know, I lose everything, and I’ll have nothing. I’ll be homeless.”
More than 15 million people live in households that owe as much as $20 billion to their landlords, according to the Aspen Institute. As of July 5, roughly 3.6 million people in the U.S. said they faced eviction in the next two months, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey.
Parts of the South and other regions with weaker tenant protections will likely see the largest spikes, and communities of color, where vaccination rates are sometimes lower, will be hit hardest. But advocates say this crisis is likely to have a wider impact than pre-pandemic evictions, reaching suburban and rural areas and working families who lost their jobs and never before experienced an eviction.
“I know personally many of the people evicted are people who worked before, who never had issues,” said Kristen Randall, a constable in Pima County, Arizona, who will be responsible for carrying out evictions starting Monday.
“These are people who already tried to find new housing, a new apartment or move in with families,” she said. “I know quite a few of them plan on staying in their cars or are looking at trying to make reservations at local shelters. But because of the pandemic, our shelter space has been more limited.”
“We are going to see a higher proportion of people go to the streets than we normally see. That is unfortunate.”
The crisis will only get worse in September when the first foreclosure proceedings are expected to begin. An estimated 1.75 million homeowners — roughly 3.5% of all homes — are in some sort of forbearance plan with their banks, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. By comparison, about 10 million homeowners lost their homes to foreclosure after the housing bubble burst in 2008.
The Biden administration had hoped that historic amounts of rental assistance allocated by Congress in December and March would help avert an eviction crisis.
But so far, only about $3 billion of the first tranche of $25 billion had been distributed through June by states and localities. Another $21.5 billion will go to the states. The speed of disbursement picked up in June, but some states like New York have distributed almost nothing. Several others have only approved a few million dollars.
“We are on the brink of catastrophic levels of housing displacement across the country that will only increase the immediate threat to public health,” said Emily Benfer, a law professor at Wake Forest University and the chair of the American Bar Association’s Task Force on Eviction, Housing Stability and Equity.
Some places will see a spike in people being evicted in the coming days, while other jurisdictions will see an increase in court filings that will lead to evictions over several months.
“It’s almost unfathomable. We are on the precipice of a nationwide eviction crisis that is entirely preventable with more time to distribute rental assistance,” Benfer said.
“The eviction moratorium is the only thing standing between millions of tenants and eviction while rental assistance applications are pending. When that essential public health tool ends on Saturday, just as the delta variant surges, the situation will become dire.”
Many beleaguered tenants will be forced out into a red-hot housing market where prices are rising and vacancy rates have plummeted.
They will be stuck with eviction records and back rent that will make it almost impossible to find new apartments, leaving many to shack up with families, turn to already strained homeless shelters or find unsafe dwellings in low-income neighborhoods that lack good schools, good jobs and access to transportation. Many will also be debt-ridden.
Evictions will also prove costly to the communities they reside in. Studies have shown evicted families face a laundry list of health problems, from higher infant mortality rates to high blood pressure to suicide. And taxpayers often foot the bill, from providing social services, health care and homeless services. One study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition and Innovation for Justice Program at the University of Arizona found costs could reach $129 billion from pandemic-related evictions.
In Rhode Island, Schaefer has struggled to grasp why her landlord wouldn’t take federal rental assistance. Landlords, many of whom have successfully challenged the moratorium in court, argue the economy is improving and coronavirus cases are down in most places. Those who don’t take rental assistance refuse for a variety of reasons, including a desire to get the tenant out.
“It’s not that I wanna live here for free,” Schaefer said. “I know wherever you go and live, you gotta pay. But I’m just asking to be reasonable.”
“Why can’t you take the rent relief? You know, they pay,” she added. “In the paperwork it says they’re gonna pay, like, two months in advance. At least by then, two months, I can save up quite a bit of money and get to put a down payment on somewhere else to move, and you’ll have your money that we owe you and will be moving out.”
___
Associated Press reporter Rodrique Ngowi in West Warwick, Rhode Island, contributed to this report.
No comments:
Post a Comment