Pandemic evictions moving again in Dade as landlords sue for action

Facing court challenges, Miami-Dade County says it has begun processing evictions filed during the COVID-19 pandemic but plans to delay evicting the most vulnerable tenants.

In testimony and court filings, Miami-Dade representatives said county police face no local moratorium on processing eviction orders from cases filed after the COVID-19 state of emergency began in March 2020. That’s a shift from prior county policies instructing police not to serve eviction papers from cases that started during the pandemic.

Instead of a blanket ban, according to court papers, Mayor Daniella Levine Cava has imposed a priority list that puts pandemic evictions at the back of the line — a pecking order that lawyers for landlords say is unfair and illegal.

“The only way to be fair is first-in, first-out,” said Paul Arcia, the Miami lawyer representing 10 landlords and condominium associations seeking to evict people with court orders that county police wouldn’t serve on the tenants. “You’ve got landlords that live off of these properties, and they haven’t gotten money from them for over a year. Through no fault of their own.”

The concessions by Miami-Dade in the lawsuit mark a turning point for a yearlong effort under two mayors to largely freeze the evictions process during the COVID-19 pandemic. Miami-Dade has declared itself ready to serve residential evictions launched during the pandemic and now is fighting in court on how quickly it must dispatch police to remove tenants from their homes.

“It’s the beginning of the end,” said David Winker, a lawyer representing landlords and tenants but not involved in the county case. “Everyone is seeing the writing on the wall.”

A CDC moratorium currently bars eviction orders against many tenants. But it is scheduled to expire March 31, setting up the first big test of MiamiDade’s ability to manage the housing fallout of a yearlong COVID-19 pandemic.

The county is processing applications for a $60 million federal rent-relief program it hopes will stave off evictions by covering up to $3,000 a month in back payments, but landlords and tenants must agree to participate. County administrators say there are about 2,000 eviction orders waiting to be processed, with more expected once federal restrictions get lifted.

“After March, we’re going to get an avalanche,” County Commissioner Raquel Regalado said in an interview. “Understand what’s coming.“

In their Feb. 19 suit against Levine Cava, Arcia’s clients claim to have eviction orders from as far back as September that county police, who report to the mayor, have declined to serve.

At the time the suit was filed, Levine Cava had continued the policy under the prior mayor, Carlos Gimenez, that instructed police not to serve residential eviction papers filed after the COVID emergency began March 12, 2020.

She reaffirmed the rule in a Feb. 25 memo to J.D Patterson, a deputy who oversees county police, writing that “my predecessor’s policy withholding the service of all other [eviction] writs ... shall remain in effect to ensure that police resources are available to address the community’s most pressing challenges.”

But at a hearing on Thursday in Miami-Dade Circuit Court, Assistant County Attorney Dave Murray described a different approach than what’s outlined in the Feb. 25 memo.

He said Miami-Dade doesn’t have a rule against serving residential evictions filed during the pandemic. Instead, he said police are instructed to prioritize other evictions, including those against people considered squatters because they didn’t have a valid lease in place.

As those evictions are served, Murray said MiamiDade police are now moving closer to serving evictions from cases filed during the pandemic — evictions that were on hold under the mayor’s prior policy.

He said Miami-Dade police are about to begin evicting tenants with cases filed during the pandemic but who aren’t covered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention federal eviction moratorium, which has income caps and other restrictions.

“Those who cannot meet the CDC moratorium ... those will go to police, those will be processed,” Murray told Judge Carlos Lopez during the online hearing. “They’re expecting to begin that process this week, actually, on a rolling basis.”

In a March 12 affidavit, Patterson outlined Levine Cava’s instructions for serving eviction papers.

The list includes five categories for eviction orders.

Commercial evictions are to be served first. Last are people who “may be eligible for protection under the CDC moratorium” but still were subject to eviction orders issued by a judge.

In a statement after the hearing, Levine Cava communications director Rachel Johnson suggested that putting eviction orders at the back of the line essentially means police will take no action on them.

She said eviction orders “in cases which do qualify for [CDC] protection are not being scheduled for service by Miami-Dade Police.”

The CDC moratorium bars judges from issuing eviction orders against a tenant who made less than $100,000 in 2020, is making partial rent payments if possible and likely will be homeless if evicted.

Rather than exempting that category of renters who meet those criteria, Patterson said those eviction papers would receive the lowest priority by police.

Arcia said the slow-walking of recent eviction cases will mean months of delay for landlords, if not rendering eviction cases useless by the delays. He estimated the current backlog will take five months to work through, based on county projections — and that assumes no new evictions come into the system. “They’re never going to catch up,” he said.

Arcia said since the suit was filed, Miami-Dade police have agreed to service four of the 12 eviction orders covered by the suit.

In the final days of his tenure, Gimenez instructed police to resume evictions filed before the emergency began, and Levine Cava continued that policy once she took office Nov. 17.

She told police to resume commercial evictions earlier this month.

In a March 10 memo, she informed commissioners that police would begin processing evictions against residential tenants who don’t meet the CDC criteria for protections.

Community groups have been pushing Levine Cava to prevent police from serving residential eviction papers, arguing even the CDC moratorium rules won’t prevent COVID-19 spread if a wave of renters become homeless.

Douglas Hanks: 305-376-3605, @doug_hanks