New bill would halt evictions for 5 months
SACRAMENTO — California tenants who have been unable to pay rent because of the coronavirus pandemic would be shielded from eviction and those who miss payments going forward could stay in their homes for at least five months, under a legislative proposal introduced Friday.
The plan would avert the possibility of eviction proceedings beginning next week against Californians who have stopped paying rent because the pandemic has cost them their jobs. But the Legislature has very little time to pass the measure before the end of its annual session Monday night, and there is no guarantee the bill will win the needed twothirds approval.
Gov. Gavin Newsom, who shepherded the negotiations, said at a news conference that he looked forward to signing the deal.
“We were able to accommodate each other’s points of view,” he said. “Not everybody pleased with every detail. That’s the nature of negotiation.”
The bill, AB3088 by Assemblyman David Chiu, DSan Francisco, would convert any missed rent from March through August into civil debt, meaning it could not be used to evict a tenant. Landlords could pursue the money in small claims court starting March 1.
Tenants facing financial hardships because of the pandemic would be expected to pay a quarter of their total rent between September and January, with the rest becoming civil debt. If they could not pay at least 25% of the rent for those five months by Jan. 31, their landlords would be allowed to file to evict them starting in February.
Newsom, legislative leaders, landlord groups and tenant rights advocates have been haggling over the measure for weeks, trying to find a way to avoid mass evictions of the millions of Californians who are out of work while also ensuring that landlords are able to meet their own financial obligations. Some of the people involved in the negotiations described them as the most intense they had ever been involved in.
Chiu, who had sought a longer eviction moratorium covering more tenants, said it became clear that “the choice was between this and nothing.” He said the deal would tide people over for five months so lawmakers could work on a new solution next session.
“This is an imperfect and necessary solution to a colossal problem,” he said. “It pains me that this will not stop every eviction.”
The California Apartment Association, which represents owners and developers of rental properties, celebrated on its website that it had secured “a lessburdensome alternative” to Chiu’s proposal.
But several groups representing tenants immediately raised concerns that evicting anyone during a pandemic is unsafe and called on Newsom to suspend all evictions through the end of the year. The Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, which organized a protest outside Newsom’s home Friday morning, said the governor was turning his back on renters.
Newsom defended himself against complaints that the deal would not go far enough.
“I don’t know that there’s another state leaning in, doing more to protect tenants, than the state of California,” he said.
Mike Herald, director of policy advocacy for the Western Center on Law & Poverty, a legal aid organization that was involved in bill negotiations, said he would be watching in the coming weeks to make sure landlords don’t look for ways to get around the law. He said the governor and Legislature must figure out a way to address the financial fallout of widespread nonpayment of rent next year.
“This staves off the worst of the potential crisis that could have come, but it does still leave off some very big issues,” he said.
The measure must pass both houses of the Legislature by a twothirds vote before the end of session at midnight Monday in order to take effect next week, when a statewide eviction moratorium put in place by the court system expires.
Eviction courts have been shut down for months in order to keep people home during the pandemic, but they are set to resume hearings again Wednesday. Under the bill, landlords could immediately pursue any case that does not involve a tenant who has been unable to pay because of a financial hardship related to the pandemic.
Residents who have lost income due to the coronavirus would have 15 days to affirm that to their landlord under penalty of perjury. Those who make more than 130% of the median income in their area, if it is above $100,000, could be asked to show proof to their landlord — an attempt to crack down on wealthier tenants who have engaged in solidarity “rent strikes” during the pandemic.
Tenants who do not make this declaration to their landlord could be evicted for nonpayment starting Oct. 5. Landlords who break the law and try to evict protected tenants anyway would face a penalty of between $1,000 and $2,500.
The resumption of eviction proceedings would not yet include a handful of counties that have adopted their own moratoriums that go further than the statewide freeze. Alameda County has extended its moratorium on residential evictions through at least the end of the year. San Francisco’s order is set to expire at the end of September.
With the state facing a multibilliondollar budget deficit, the legislative deal does not include any direct financial relief for landlords, many of whom risk losing their own homes or rental properties without the income from tenants’ payments. The shortterm approach of the bill is a hedge that there may be a new president and Congress next year willing to provide a federal bailout.
A separate provision would temporarily extend some additional foreclosure rights to landlords who own no more than three rental properties, each containing four or fewer units. If any of their tenants are unable to pay rent because of the pandemic, those landlords would be protected under a state law that requires their mortgage servicers to contact them at least 30 days before foreclosure to explore alternatives. That right would expire in 2023.
The California Rental Housing Association, another landlord group, complained that the bill would unfairly force small property owners to shoulder the financial burdens of missed rent payments.
“Asking them to go to the banks and beg for forbearance, that doesn’t come across as the right solution to the problem,” the group’s president, Sid Lakireddy, said.
But unless the federal government passes another coronavirus relief package or local officials use their existing aid to cover missed rent payments, this is the best deal available, said Debra Carlton, a lobbyist at the California Apartment Association who helped craft the bill.
“Nobody’s going to be happy — that’s the sad part of this,” she said. “And there’s no real good answers.”