Some states are helping with the rent for April
Shanette Joyner wasn’t worried about making her rent payment on Wednesday. But her autistic daughter lost her job at a Panera Bread because of the pandemic, her brother in California lost his job at a bookstore, and her son’s employer is cutting his hours as a software developer – putting all of them at risk of not making rent.
Making matters worse, Joyner’s parents would usually step in to help, but her 66-year-old mother is now filing for unemployment in Newport News, Virginia, after deciding to stay home from her job as a painter at a
Alan Gomez
shipping yard where several workers tested positive for COVID-19. That has left Joyner holding nightly calls with relatives trying to figure out who needs money the most urgently.
Joyner, 49, a paralegal who has been able to continue working from her Alexandria, Virginia, apartment during the coronavirus outbreak, said the financial stimulus passed last week by Congress definitely will help whenever the checks arrive. But the stress of making sure everyone in her family can pay their rent is pushing her to her limit.
“I do have a therapist if it gets to
that point,” Joyner said. “The government, I don’t think, is realizing that people’s mental health is in jeopardy because of the lack of action that the government has taken, and how long it took them to act.”
With rent due this week for many Americans for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak erupted across the U.S., people across the country have been urging federal, state and local governments to institute eviction moratoriums as a record 3.3 million Americans have filed for unemployment in a crisis that could lead to nearly 50 million people losing their jobs. Landlords are also pleading for help, saying that if millions of tenants are allowed to forego their rent indefinitely, they may go bankrupt and be forced to sell the houses, apartments and condos they rent out.
On social media, #RentZero and #RentRelief have exploded in recent days, with people urging President Donald Trump and their local politicians to take more action to protect renters as they’re being told to shelter at home but are losing their jobs and struggling to pay rent.
The federal government took a big step toward protecting renters by issuing a 120-day moratorium on evictions from federally subsidized housing or from a property with a federally backed mortgage loan. And a USA TODAY analysis shows that at least 34 states have issued broader moratoriums on evictions as of Tuesday.
Some states bar evictions for a few weeks, some for the duration of the state of emergency issued in those states. Some states bar all evictions, some only in cases where the tenant has been diagnosed with coronavirus or suffered a job loss because of it.
And a few states have not only barred evictions but dedicated state dollars to helping people pay their rent. In Delaware, Democratic Gov. John Carney barred any evictions until the state’s emergency declaration is lifted and the state will provide up to $1,500 to renters who have lost income because of the pandemic.
Four states have taken partial measures. In Florida, the state Supreme
Court issued an order that could limit evictions, but the order has caused confusion among county clerks.
That confusion was on display last week in Bradenton, Florida, where the property managers of Robin’s Apartments sent a letter to renters explaining that, “If you think that you don’t have to pay rent because of the pandemic, you are mistaken,” according to the Bradenton Herald.
That leaves 12 states that have taken no states measures to limit or halt evictions.
The most populous of those states is Georgia, where an online petition has garnered more than 20,000 signatures urging Republican Gov. Brian Kemp to issue a moratorium on evictions during the pandemic. In Colorado, Democratic Gov. Jared Polis has urged landlords not to evict renters but has not forbidden them from doing so, leading to the creation of a legal defense group to help those hit by eviction notices. .
Dozens of mayors and local governments from Denver to New Orleans to St. Louis have also issued eviction moratoriums, providing some relief to renters in those cities. But that has still left millions unsure of what will happen in the coming days.
In Arizona, renters can avoid eviction only if they prove they contracted the virus or suffered a “substantial loss of income” as a result of the outbreak.
As the potential end of the national shutdown continues to push farther back into the summer, landlords are also facing a difficult road.
The National Multifamily Housing Council, a coalition of apartment building managers, along with 10 other real estate organizations, sent a letter to Congress and the White House applauding efforts to help renters pay their rents, but pleaded for help of their own.
The National Apartment Association, whose members operate more than 10 million rental housing units in the U.S., says the eviction moratoriums included in the federal stimulus package should have made clear that only people hurt by coronavirus should be protected by the government.
“What should be a limited protective step is expanded to those who have not been financially impacted by the pandemic,” the association said in a statement. “This is already creating an expectation that unaffected renters do not have to meet their lease obligations.”