Will N.Y. extend eviction protections?

ALBANY, N.Y. » New York’s legislature will convene for a special session Wednesday to potentially extend the state’s moratorium on evictions, put in place to protect tenants and property owners who fell behind on their rent or their mortgage because of hardships caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The moratorium was set to expire at the end of the day Tuesday. Lawmakers expect to return midday Wednesday to address the issue, according to spokespeople for Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, a Democrat, and for Republicans in the state Assembly.

If lawmakers decide to extend the moratorium, they will have to change how it works. In an Aug. 12 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court nixed part of the moratorium that allowed tenants to pause eviction proceedings simply by filing a form declaring they’d had a pandemic-related hardship.

Months ago, lawmakers had expected New York wouldn’t still need an eviction moratorium this fall because the state approved a $2.4 billion fund expected to help as many as 200,000 households late on their rent.

But New York has only released a small percentage of that money so far: $200 million as of Aug. 23. Gov. Kathy Hochul has promised to get the money out more quickly.

Here’s a look at what tenants and landlords should expect going forward:

What legal protections do tenants still have?

Even after the moratorium expires, tenants who apply for emergency COVID-19 rental assistance are protected while the state reviews whether they qualify for aid. If they are approved, they can’t be evicted for up to one year for having failed to pay rent because of a pandemic hardship.

What protections have ended?

With the expiration of the moratorium, property owners who fell behind on mortgage pay

ments because of the pandemic are no longer protected from foreclosure.

Since the Supreme Court ruling, tenants can no longer avoid eviction by filing paperwork declaring a financial or medical hardship because of the pandemic. The justice ruled that process, while convenient for tenants, deprived landlords of their right to challenge the accuracy of those declarations in court.

Hochul called the court’s ruling “appalling and insensitive” and said she was exploring options for a fix. Senate Housing Chair Brian Kavanagh said lawmakers may allow landlords to challenge

a tenant’s hardship declaration.

A federal eviction moratorium has also expired. President Joe Biden’s attempt to extend it via an order from the Centers from Disease Control and Prevention was struck down by the the U.S. Supreme Court, which said the public health agency exceeded its authority.

What do landlords say?

Landlords are blasting New York for considering extending the moratorium. S maller landlords say they can’t afford to cover months of more housing debt.

Will New York see a flood of evictions?

Housing courts in New York move slowly and it is possible that legal bottlenecks

and existing tenant protections will prevent a surge of evictions from happening immediately.

But Legal Aid Society attorney Ellen Davidson said eviction cases and notices in New York are already “picking up” since the court ruling. She raised concern about a surge in eviction proceedings amid the highly contagious COVID-19 variant. And she said tenants outside New York City lack the right to an attorney and may not know about eviction protections.

It might also be difficult, she said, for courts to easily learn whether a tenant has applied for rental relief. There is no centralized lookup system to see if a tenant submitted an application and therefore qualifies for a pause in eviction proceedings.